The Anarchist Library: Anonymous 500 Years of Indigenous Resistance a4

Anonymous

500 Years of Indigenous
Resistance

1992

The Anarchist Library

Contents

Introduction 3

The Pre-Columbian World 3

The Genocide Begins 6

Expansion, Exploitation, and Extermination 8

The Penetration of North America 11

The European Struggle for Hegemony 14

Tragedy: The United States is Created 16

Revolutions in the 'New World' 18

Manifest Destiny and the US 'Indian Wars' 22

Afrikan Slavery, Afrikan Rebellion, and the US Civil War . . 23

Black Reconstruction and Deconstruction 25

The Colonization of Canada 26

Extermination — Assimilation: Two Methods, One Goal ... 31

The People Aim for Freedom 36

The Struggle for Land 39

In Total Resistance 41

2

Introduction

Throughout the year 1992, the various states which have profited from the colo-
nization of the Americas will be conducting lavish celebrations of the "Discovery
of the Americas". Spain has spent billion of dollars for celebrations in conjunc-
tion with Expo '92 in Seville. In Columbus, Ohio, a $100 million quinccntcnnial
celebration plans on entertaining several million tourists. CELAM, the associa-
tion of South America's Catholic bishops, has organized a gathering to celebrate
the "fifth centenary of the evangelization of the Americas" to be presided over
by the Pope. As well, there is a wide selection of museum exhibits, films, TV
shows, books and many other products and activities focusing on Columbus
and the "Discovery", all presenting one interpretation of the 500 years following
1492. The main thrust of this interpretation being that the colonization process
— a process of genocide — has, with a few "bad spots", been overall a mutu-
ally beneficial process. The "greatness" of European religions and cultures was
brought to the Indigenous peoples, who in return shared the lands and after
"accidentally" being introduced to European disease, simply died off and whose
descendants now fill the urban ghettos as alcoholics and welfare recipients. Of
course, a few "remnants" of Indian cultures was retained, and there are even a
few "professional" Indian politicians running around.

That was no "Discovery" — it was an American Indian Holo-
caust!

Until recently, commonly accepted population levels of the indigenous peo-
ples on the eve of 1492 were around 10-15 million. This number continues to
be accepted by individuals and groups who see 1492 as a "discovery" in which
only a few million Indians died — and then mostly from diseases. More recent
demographic studies place the Indigenous population at between 70 to 100 mil-
lion peoples, with some 10 million in North America, 30 million in Mesoamerica,
and around 50 to 70 million in South America.

Today, in spite of 500 years of a genocidal colonization, there is an estimated
40 million Indigenous peoples in the Americas. In Guatemala, the Mayan peo-
ples make up 60.3 percent of the population, and in Bolivia Indians comprise
over 70 percent of the total population. Despite this, these Indigenous peo-
ples lack any control over their own lands and comprise the most exploited and
oppressed layers of the population; characteristics that are found also in other
Indigenous populations in the settler states of the Americas (and throughout
the world).

The Pre-Columbian World

Before the European colonization of the Americas, in that time of life scholars
refer to as "Pre-history" or "Pre-Columbian", the Western hemisphere was a
densely populated land. A land with its own peoples and ways of life, as varied
and diverse as any of the other lands in the world.

In fact, it was not even called "America" by those peoples. If there was
any reference to the land as a whole it was as Turtle Island, or Cuscatlan, or
Abya-Yala.

The First Peoples inhabited every region of the Americas, living within the
diversity of the land and developing cultural life ways dependent on the land.

3

Their numbers approached 70-100 million peoples prior to the European colo-
nization.

Generally, the hundreds of different nations can be summarized within the
various geographical regions they lived in. The commonality of cultures within
these regions is in fact a natural development of people building life-ways de-
pendent on the land. As well, there was extensive interaction and interrelation
between the people in these regions, and they all knew each other as nations.

In the Arctic region live(d) the Inuit and Aleut, whose lifeways revolve(d)
around the hunting of sea mammals (Beluga whales, walruses, etc.) and caribou,
supplemented by fishing and trading with the people to the south.

South of the Arctic, in the Subarctic region of what is today Alaska, the
Northwest Territories, and the northern regions of the Canadian provinces,
live(d) predominantly hunting and fishing peoples. The variations of these
lands range from open tundra to forests and lakes, rivers, and streams. The
Cree, Chipewyan, Kaska, Chilcotin, Ingalik, Beothuk, and many other nations
inhabit(cd) this region, hunting bear, goats, and deer in the west, musk oxen
and caribou further north, or buffalo further south in the prairies.

Altogether in the Arctic and Subarctic regions there lived perhaps as many
as 100,000 people.

On the Pacific Northwest coast, stretching from the coasts of Alaska and BC
down to northern California, live(d) the Tlingit, Haida, Tsimshian, Kwa-Kwa-
Ka'wakw, Nuu-chah-nulth, Nuxalk, Salish, Yurok, and many others. These
peoples developed a lifeway revolving around fishing. The peoples of this region
numbered as many as four million.

Between the Pacific coastal mountain range and the central plains in what
is today southern BC, Washington, Oregon, Idaho and Montana, live(d) the
Sahaptin (Nez Perce), Chopunnish, Shoshone, Siksikas (Blackfeet), and others.
These peoples numbered around 200,000.

To the east were people of the plains, encompassing a vast region from Texas
up to parts of southern Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba, eastward to
North and South Dakota, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Missouri, and Arkansas. Here,
the Lakota (Sioux), Cheyenne, Arapaho, plains Cree, Siksikas (of the Blackfeet
Confederacy, including the Blood and Pcigan), Crow, Kiowa, Shoshone, Man-
dan, and many others, numbered up to one million, and the buffalo as many as
80 million before their slaughter by the Europeans.

Further east, in the lands stretching from the Great Lakes to the Atlantic
coast, live(d) hunting, fishing, and farming peoples; the Kanicnkchake (Mo-
hawks), Oneida, Onondaga, Cayuga, Seneca (these five nations formed the
Haudenosaunee — the People of the Longhouse — also known as the Iroquois
Confederacy), Ojibway, Algonkin, Micmac, Wendat (Huron), Potowatomi, Tus-
carora, and others. In this woodland region, stretching from Ontario, Quebec,
and New York, down to the Carolinas, lived up to two million peoples.

South of this area, from parts of the Virginias down to Florida, west of
the Gulf of Mexico including Mississippi and Louisiana, live(d) The Muskogee-
speaking Choctaw, Creek, and Chikasaw, the Cherokee, Natchez, Tonkawa,
Atakapa, and others. One of the most fertile agricultural belts in the world,
farming was well established supplemented by hunting and fishing. These peo-
ples numbered between two and three million.

East of this area, in the south-western United States, extending down to
northern Mexico and California, live(d) agrarian and nomadic peoples; the

4

Pueblo, Hopi, Zuni, the Yumun-speaking Hualapai, Mojave, Yuma, and Cocopa,
the Uto-Aztecan speaking Pimas and Papagos, and the Athapascans consisting
of the Navajo (Dine) and Apache peoples. These peoples, altogether, numbered
about two million.

In the Mesoamerican region, including Mexico, Guatemala and Belize, live(d)
the numerous agricultural peoples, whose primary staple was maize; the Aztecs,
Tcxacoco, Tlacopan, and the Mayans — in the Yucatan peninsula. Here, large
city-states with stone and brick buildings and pyramids, as well as extensive
agrarian waterways consisting of dams and canals were built. Written languages
were published in books, and the study of astronomy and mathematics was well
established. A calendar system more accurate than any in Europe during the
15th century was developed. Altogether, these peoples numbered around 30-40
million.

In the Caribbean basin, including the coastal areas of Columbia, Venezuela,
Costa Rica, Honduras, and the many small islands such as Cuba, Hispaniola,
Puerto Rico etc., live(d) hunting, fishing, and agrarian peoples such as the Carib,
Arawak, Warao, Yukpa, Paujanos, and others. These peoples numbered around
five million.

In all of South America there were as many as 40-50 million peoples.

In the Andean highlands of Peru and Chile live(d) the Inca peoples, com-
prised of the Quechua and Aymara. In the south of Chile livc(d) the Ma-
puche, and in the lowland regions — including the Amazon region — live(d)
the Yanomami, Gavioe, Txukahame, Kreen, Akarore, and others. South of
the Amazon region, in Argentina, Paraguay, and Uruguay, live(d) the Ayoreo,
Ache, Mataco, Guarani, and many others. In the southernmost lands live(d)
the Qawasgar, Selk'nam, Onu, and others.

With a few exceptions, the First Nations were classless and communitarian
societies, with strong matrilincal features. The political sphere of Indigenous
life was not dominated by men, but in many cases the responsibility of women.
Elders held a position of importance and honour for their knowledge. There
were no prisons, for the First Nations peoples had well developed methods of
resolving community problems, and there was from the accounts of elders
— very little in anti-social crime. Community decisions were most frequently
made by consensus and discussions amongst the people.

But the First Nations were not perfect, being humans they had, and still
have, their inconsistencies and practises that are not positive.

Some examples can be seen as the armed conflicts between nations through-
out the Americas, and practises of slavery amongst the Pacific Northwest coast
peoples and in the Mesoamerican region. However, even here the forms of war-
fare reflected similar developments throughout the world, and in any case never
approached the genocidal methods developed, in particular, in Europe. Warfare
was the practise of explicitly warrior societies. The accounts of slavery, although
there is no way to explain it away, differed sharply from the Europeans in that it
was not based on racism, nor was it a fundamental characteristic which formed
the economic basis of these societies.

The history of the First Nations must always be analyzed critically; those
who tell us that history are rarely ever of the Indigenous peoples.

5

The Genocide Begins

"Their bodies swelled with greed, and their hunger was ravenous."
— Aztec testimonial

On October 12, 1492, sailing aboard the Santa Maria under finance from
the Spanish crown, Cristoforo Colombo stumbled upon the island of Guanahani
(believed to be San Salvador), in the Caribbean region. Initially charting a new
trade route to Asian markets, the outcome of Colombo's voyage would quickly
prove far more lucrative than the opening of new trade routes, as far as Europe
was concerned.

It was on Guanahani that Colombo first encountered Taino Arawaks, whom
he titled 'Indians', believing he had in fact reached Asia. For this initial en-
counter, Colombo's own log stands as testimony to his own greed:

"No sooner had we concluded the formalities of taking possession
of the island than people began to come to the beach. . . They are
friendly and well-dispositioned people who bear no arms except for
small spears.

"They ought to make good and skilled servants. . . I think they can
easily be made Christians, for they seem to have no religion. If it
pleases Our Lord, I will take six of them to Your Highnesses when I
depart" (from Colombo's log, October 12, 1492). 1

True to his word, if little else, Colombo kidnapped about 9 Taino during
his journey through the Bahamas, and anticipated even more kidnappings and
enslavement,

". . .these people are very unskilled in arms. Your Highnesses will
see this for yourselves when I bring you the seven that I have taken.
After they learn our languages I shall return them, unless Your High-
nesses order that the entire population be taken to Castillo, or held
captive here. With 50 men you could subject everyone and make
them do what you wished" (Colombo's log, October 14, 1492). 2

Throughout Colombo's log of this first voyage, there is constant reference to
the notion that the Taino believe the Europeans to be descended from heaven,
despite the fact that [neither] Colombo nor any of his crew understood Arawak.
Another consistency in Colombo's log is the obsession with gold, to which there
are 16 references in the first two weeks alone, 13 in the following month, and
46 more in the next five weeks, despite the fact that Colombo found very little
gold on either Guanahani or any of the other islands he landed on.

In a final reference to Colombo's log, one can also find the dual mission
Colombo undertook,

"... Your Highnesses must resolve to make them (the Taino — Oh-
Toh-Kin ed.) Christians. I believe that if this effort commences, in

1 Robert H. Fuson, The Log of Christopher Colombus, International Marine Publishing Co.,
Maine 1987, pg. 76.

2 Ibid, pg. 80. Colombo was inconsistent on the actual number of Taino he kidnapped.

6

a short time a multitude of peoples will be converted to our Holy
Faith, and Spain will acquire great domains and riches and all of
their villages. Beyond doubt there is a very great amount of gold
in this country. . . Also, there are precious stones and pearls, and an
infinite quantity of spices" (Colombo's log, November 11, 1492). 3

The duality of Colombo's mission, and the subsequent European invasion
that followed, was the Christianization of non- Europeans and the expropria-
tion of their lands. The two goals are not unconnected; "Christianization"
was not merely a program for European religious indoctrination, it was an at-
tack on non-European culture (one barrier to colonization) and a legally and
morally sanctioned form of war for conquest. "Even his name was prophetic to
the world he encountered Christopher Columbus translates to 'Christ-bearer
Colonizer' ". 4

Still on his first voyage, Colombo meandered around the Caribbean and
eventually established the first Spanish settlement, 'Natividad', on the island of
Hispaniola (today Haiti and the Dominican Republic). Leaving about 35 men
on Hispaniola, Colombo and his crew returned to Spain to gather the materials
and men needed for the coming colonization, and to report to the crown on his
journey.

In September, 1493, Colombo returned to Hispaniola with a fleet of 17 ships
and 1,200 men. The detachment that had been left on Hispaniola had been
destroyed following outrages by the Spaniards against the Taino. The resistance
had already begun.

Colombo would make four voyages in all, the remaining two in 1498 and
1502. His voyages around the Caribbean brought him to what is now Trinidad,
Panama, Jamaica, Venezuela, Dominica, and several other islands capturing
Native peoples for slavery and extorting gold through a quota of a hawks bell
of gold dust to be supplied by every Native over the age of 14 every 3 months.
Failure to fill the quota often entailed cutting the 'violators' hands off and
leaving them to bleed to death. Hundreds of Carib and Arawak were shipped
to Spain as slaves under Colombo's governorship, 500 alone following his second
voyage. Indeed, the absence of a "great amount of gold" in the Caribbean had
Colombo devising another method of financing the colonization: "The savage
and cannibalistic Carib should be exchanged as slaves against livestock to be
provided by merchants in Spain."

Colombo died in 1506, but following his initial voyage to the Americas, wave
upon wave of first Spanish, then Portuguese, Dutch, French and British expedi-
tions followed, carrying with them conquistadors, mercenaries, merchants, and
Christian missionaries.

Hispaniola served as the first beachhead, used by the Spanish as a staging
ground for armed incursions and reconnaissance missions, justified through the
'Christianization' program; one year after Colombo's first voyage, Pope Alexan-
der VI in his inter cetera divina papal bull granted Spain all the world not
already possessed by Christian states, excepting the region of Brazil, which
went to Portugal.

While the Spanish laid the groundwork for their colonization plans, other
European nations began to send their own expeditions.

3 Ibid, pg. 107.

4 Akwesasne Notes, Vol. 9, No. 4.

7

In 1497, Giovanni Caboto Motecataluna (John Cabot), financed by England,
crossed the Atlantic and charted the Atlantic coast of North America. Under the
commission of Henry VII to "conquer, occupy, and possess" the lands of "hea-
thens and infidels", Cabot reconnoitered the Newfoundland coast — kidnapping
three Micmacs in the process.

At around the same time, Gaspar Corte Real, financed by Portugal, recon-
noitered the Labrador and Newfoundland coasts, kidnapping 57 Beothuks to be
sold as slaves to offset the cost of the expedition.

Meanwhile, Amerigo Vespucci — for whom the Americas were named after
— and Alonso de Ojedo, on separate missions for Spain, reconnoitered the west
Indies and the Pacific coast of South America. Ojedo was actively carrying out
slave raids, and was killed by a warrior's poisoned arrow for his efforts.

From the papal bull of 1493 and a subsequent Treaty of Tordcsillas (1494),
Portugal had been given possession of Brazil. In 1500, the Portuguese admiral
Pedro Alvares Cabral formally claimed the land for the Portuguese crown.

Now that the initial reconnaissance missions had been completed, the in-
vasion intensified and expanded. In 1513, Ponce de Leon, financed by Spain,
attempted to land in Florida, but was driven off by 80 Calusa war canoes.

From 1517 to 1521, the Spanish conquistador Hernando Cortes laid waste
to the Aztec empire in Mexico, capturing the capital city of Tcnochtitlan and
killing millions in a ruthless campaign for gold.

Shortly afterwards, in 1524, Pedro de Alvarado invaded the region of El
Salvador, attacking the Cuscatlan, Pipeles, and Quiche peoples. In Guatemala
Alvarado conducted eight major campaigns against the Mayans, and while he
and his men were burning people alive, the Catholic priests accompanying him
were busy destroying Mayan historical records (that is, while they weren't busy
directing massacres themselves). Alvarado's soldiers were rewarded by being
allowed to enslave the survivors.

In 1531, the Spaniard Francisco Pizarro invaded the region of the Incas (now
Peru) . Taking advantage of an internal struggle between two Inca factions led
by the brothers Huascar and Atahualpa, Pizarro succeeded in subjugating the
Incas by 1533.

Ten years later, Pedro de Valdivia claimed Chile for the Spanish crown, al-
though fierce resistance by the Mapuche nation restricted the Spanish to the
northern and central regions. Valdivia was eventually killed in battle by Ma-
puche warriors.

During this same period, Jacques Cartier, financed by France in 1534, was
reconnoitering the eastern regions of what would become Canada, and Spaniards
such as Hernando de Sotos, Marcos de Niza and others began penetrating into
North America, claiming the lands for their respective countries, as was their
custom.

Expansion, Exploitation, and Extermination

"I am Smallpox. . . I come from far away. . . where the great water is
and then far beyond it. I am a friend of the Big Knives who have
brought me; they are my people."

— Jamakc Highwater, Anpao: an Indian Odyssey

8

The formulative years of the colonization process were directed towards ex-
ploiting the lands and peoples to the fullest. To the Europeans, the Americas
was a vast, unspoiled area suitable for economic expansion and exploitation.

The primary activity was the accumulation of gold and silver, then a form
of currency among the European nations. This accumulation was first accom-
plished through the crudest forms of theft and plunder (ie. Colombo's and
Cortes' methods). Eventually, more systematic forms were developed, includ-
ing the encomiendas — a form of taxation imposed on Indigenous communities
that had been subjugated, and the use of Indigenous slaves to pan the rivers
and streams. By the mid-1500s, the expropriation of gold and silver involved
intensive mining. Entire cities and towns developed around the mines. Millions
of Indigenous peoples died working as slaves in the mines at Guanajuato and
Zacatecas in Mexico, and Potosi in Bolivia. By the end of the 1500s, Potosi
was one of the largest cities in the world at 350,000 inhabitants. Peru was also
another area of intensive mining. From the time of the arrival of the first Euro-
pean colonizers until 1650, 180-200 tons of gold — from the Americas — was
added to the European treasury. In today's terms, that gold would be worth
$2.8 billion. 5 During the same period, eight million slaves died in the Potosi
mines alone.

Slavery was another major economic activity. Not only for work in the mines,
but also for export to Europe. In Nicaragua alone, the first ten years of intensive
slaving, beginning in 1525, saw an estimated 450,000 Miskitu and Sumu peoples
shipped to Europe. Tens of thousands perished in the ships that transported
them. Subsequently, the slave trade would turn to Afrika, beginning in the
mid-1500s when Portuguese colonists brought Afrikan slaves to Brazil to cut
cane and clear forest area for the construction of settlements and churches. An
estimated 15 million Afrikan peoples would be brought as slaves to the Americas
by 1800, and a further 40 million or so perished in the transatlantic crossing in
the miserable conditions of the ships holds.

In areas such as the highlands of northern Chile, Peru, Guatemala, and
Mexico, where the climate was more suitable, the Spanish were able to grow
crops such as wheat, cauliflower, cabbage, lettuce, radish, sugar cane, and later
grapes, bananas, and coffee. By the mid-1500s, using slave labour, many of
these crops — particularly wheat and sugar cane — were large-scale exports for
the European markets.

In other areas, sprawling herds of cattle were established. Herds which rarely
exceeded 800 or 1,000 in Spain reached as many as 8,000 in Mexico. By 1579,
some ranches in northern Mexico had up to 150,000 head of cattle. 6

The effects of extensive land-clearing for the crops and ranches and intensive
mining culminated in increasing deforestation and damage to the lands. More
immediately for the Indigenous peoples in the region, particularly those who
lived on subsistence agriculture, was the dismantling of destruction of agrarian
ways replaced by export crops.

In order to carry out this expansion and exploitation, the subjugation of the
First Nations was a necessity, and the task of colonizing other peoples was one
in which the Europeans had had plenty of experience.

5 Jack Weatherford, Indian Givers, Ballantine Books, New York, 1988.
6 Alfrcd W. Crosby, "The Biological Consequences of 1492", Report on the Americas, Vol.
XXV No. 2, pg. 11. 7.

9

"In a sense, the first people colonized under the profit motivation by
the use of labour. . . were the European and English peasantry. Ire-
land, Bohemia and Catalonia were colonized. The Moorish nation,
as well as the Judaic Scphardic nation, were physically deported by
the Crown of Castille from the Iberian peninsula. . . All the methods
for relocation, deportation and expropriation, were already practised
if not perfected". 7

Prior to Colombo's 1492 voyage, the development of a capitalist mode of
production emerging from feudalism had dispossessed European peasants of in-
dependent production and subsistence agriculture. Subsequently, they were to
enter into a relationship of forced dependence to land-owners and manufactur-
ers, leading to periods of intense class struggle, particularly as the Industrial
Revolution (fueled by the expropriation of materials from the Americas and
Afrika) loomed ever larger.

Indeed, the majority of Europeans who emigrated to the Americas in the
16th, 17th, and 18th centuries were impoverished merchants, petit-bourgeois
traders, mercenaries, and Christian missionaries all hoping to build their for-
tunes in the 'New World' and escape the deepening class stratification that was
quickly developing. However, the first permanent settlements were limited, their
main purpose being to facilitate and maintain areas of exploitation. During the
entire 16th century, only an estimated 100,000 Europeans were permanent em-
igrants to the Americas.

Their effects, however, were overwhelming; in the same 100 year period, the
populations of the Indigenous peoples declined from 70-100 million to around 12
million. The Aztec nation alone had been reduced from around 30 million to 3
million in one 50 year period. The only term which describes this depopulation
is that of Genocide; an American Indian holocaust.

Apologists for the Genocide attribute the majority of deaths to the introduc-
tion of disease epidemics such as smallpox and measles by unknowing Europeans.

While attempting to diminish the scale and intensity of the Genocide (other
forms of this diminishment arc claiming the population of the Americas was a
much smaller portion than generally accepted demographic numbers), such a
perspective disregards the conditions in which these diseases were introduced.
Conditions such as wars, massacres, slavery, scorched earth policies and the
subsequent destruction of subsistence agriculture and food-stocks, and the ac-
companying starvation, malnutrition, and dismemberment of communally-based
cultures.

These conditions were not introduced by "unknowing" Europeans; they were
parts of a calculated campaign based on exploitation in which the extermination
of Indigenous peoples was a crucial factor.

European diseases introduced into these conditions came as an after-effect
of the initial attacks. And their effects were disastrous. Once the effects of the
epidemics were realized however, the use of biological warfare was also planned in
the form of infected blankets and other textiles supplied to Indigenous peoples.

7 Roxanne Dunbar Ortiz, Indians of the Americas, Praeger Publishers, New York 1984.

10

The Penetration of North America

While the Spanish were destroying the Caribbean and Mesoamerican region,
the Portuguese were carrying out similar campaigns in Brazil. The patterns
established by the Spanish would be repeated by the Portuguese during the
16th and 17th centuries in Brazil, Uruguay, and Paraguay.

By the beginning of the 17th century, the Spanish and Portuguese had pene-
trated virtually every region in the southern hemisphere, establishing numerous
settlements facilitated with the help of Jesuit and Franciscan missionaries, as
well as mines, ranches, and plantations. Despite all this, there were still large ar-
eas in which European claims to lands remained a theoretical proposition; these
areas remained outside of European control with fierce Indigenous resistance.
This was particularly so in the southern regions.

During this period, French, Dutch, and advance elements of the British also
established settlements in the Caribbean.

In 1604, the French occupied the island of Guadaloupe, followed by the
island of Martinique and various smaller islands in the West Indies. In 1635
they occupied what is now French Guiana.

Meanwhile, the Dutch occupied a coastal region that would eventually be-
come Surinam (Dutch Guiana) as well as settlements established by the Dutch
West India Company in the area of Belize (which would later become a British
colony) .

The Dutch, French, and British were relatively limited in their exploits in
the South Americas, and it would be in North America where their main efforts
would be directed.

As has already been noted, French expeditions had penetrated the north-
eastern regions of what would become Quebec and the Atlantic provinces, in
the 1530s. In 1562 and 1564, the French attempted to establish settlements
in South Carolina and Florida, but were driven out by the Spanish (who had
claimed Florida in 1539 during de Soto's perilous expedition).

In 1585 the British also attempted settlements, on Roanoke Island in North
Carolina, and again in 1586. Both attempts failed when the settlers-to-be were
unable to survive.

In the period up to 1600, more reconnaissance missions were conducted; in
1576 Martin Frobisher charted the Arctic coasts encountering Inuuk, and in
1578 Francis Drake charted the coast of California.

Meanwhile, the Spanish were pushing into North America from their bases
in southern Mexico, encountering resistance from Pueblos and others.

In the beginning of the 1600s, as the horse spread throughout the south-
west and into the plains, Samuel de Champlain expanded on Cartiers' earlier
expedition, penetrating as far west as Lake Huron and Lake Ontario, his at-
tacks on Onondago communities, using Wendat (Huron) warriors, would turn
the Haudenosaunee against the French.

In 1606, the British finally succeeded in establishing their first permanent
settlement in North America at Jamestown, Virginia. In 1620, Pilgrims (English
Puritans) landed on the east coast also, establishing the Plymouth colony.

Meanwhile, Bcothuks in Newfoundland had retaliated against a French at-
tack in clashes that followed killed 37 French settlers. The French responded by
arming Micmacs — traditional enemies of the Beothuks — and offering bounties
for Beothuk scalps. This is believed to the origin of 'scalp-taking' by Native war-

11

riors; the stereo-type of Native 'savagery' was in fact introduced by the French
and, later, the Dutch. The combined attacks by the French and Micmacs led to
the eventual extermination of the Beothuk nation.

In 1624, the Dutch established Fort Orange (later to become Albany, New
York) and claimed the area as New Netherland.

While the Atlantic coast area of North America was becoming quickly lit-
tered with British, French and Dutch settlements, substantial differences in the
lands and resources forced the focus of exploitation to differ from the coloniza-
tion process underway in Meso- and South America.

In the South, the large-scale expropriation of gold and silver financed much of
the invasion. As well, the dense populations of the Indigenous peoples provided
a large slave-labour force to work in the first mines and plantations.

In contrast, the Europeans who began colonizing North America found a
lower population density and the lands, though fertile for crops and abundant
in fur-bearing animals, contained little in precious metals accessible to 17th
century European technology.

The exploitation of North America was to require long-term activities which
could not rely on Indigenous or Afrikan slavery but in fact which required Indige-
nous participation. Maintaining colonics thousands of miles away from Europe
and lacking the gold which financed the Spanish armada, the colonial forces in
North America would have to rely on the gradual accumulation of agricultural
products and the fur trade.

In this way, the initial settlements relied largely on the hospitality afforded
them by the Native peoples. Earlier attempts at European settlements had failed
for precisely this reason, as the Europeans found themselves almost completely
ignorant of the land.

The growing European colonics quickly set about acquiring already cleared
and cultivated land, and their expansionist policies led to fierce competition
between the colonies. This bitter struggle for domination of land and trade
frequently began and ended with attacks against Indigenous communities. One
of the first of these 'strategic attacks' occurred in 1622 when a force from the
Plymouth colony massacred a group of Pequots. In retaliation, Pcquote war-
riors attacked a settler village at Wessagusset, which was then abandoned and
subsequently absorbed into the dominion of the Plymouth colony, which had
coveted the trade and land enjoyed by the Wessagusset settlers.

By 1630, the Massachusetts Bay colony had been established, and 'New
England', once only a vague geographical expression came to apply in practise
to the colonies of New Plymouth, Salem, Nantucket, Rhode Island, Connecticut,
New Haven and others.

The expansionist drives of the Massachusetts colonists consisted of massacres
carried out against first the Pequot and eventually the Narragansetts between
1634 and 1648. 8

It was in this period that the transition between European dependence on
Native peoples began to be reversed. Through the establishment and expansion
of European colonies, increased contact with First Nations brought extensive
trading, as well as disease epidemics and conflict.

Trade gradually served to break up Indigenous societies,

8 Francis Jennings, The Invasion of America: Indians, Colonialism, and the Cant of Con-
quest, University of North Carolina Press. Jennings documents the activities of these first
colonies, frequently relying on period manuscripts.

12

"Indian industry became less specialized and divided as it entered
into closer relations of exchange with European industry. For the In-
dians, intersocietal commerce triumphed by subordinating and elimi-
nating all crafts except those directly related to the European-Indian
trade, while intertribal trading relations survived only insofar as they
served the purposes of intersocietal trade". 9

Thus, trade with European industry developed a relationship of growing
dependence on the European colonists. The items traded to Natives — metal
pots, knives, and occasionally rifles — were of European manufacture and sup-
ply. The trade also disrupted and changed traditional Native methods in other
ways, with the introduction of alcohol and exterminationist forms of warfare —
including torture — under the direction of the colonialists, as well as an overall
escalation in warfare in the competition-driven fur trade and introduction of
European rifles.

While disease epidemics began to spread throughout the Atlantic coastal
area, the colonialists also relied to a large extent on exploiting and exaggerating
already existing hostilities between First Nations, as the Spanish and Portuguese
had also done in their campaigns,

"The grim epics of Cortes and Pizarro, not to speak of Columbus
himself, testify to the military abilities of Spanish soldiery, but these
need to be compared as well with the great failures of Narvaez, Coro-
nado and de Soto. . . (The conquistadors) did not conquer Mexico
and Peru unaided. Native allies were indispensable. . . North of New
Spain, invasion started later, so Frenchmen, Dutchmen, and English-
men found native communities. . . already reduced by epidemic from
base populations that never approached the size of Mexico". 10

It was at this time that the concept of treaty making began to take hold.
In keeping with the English colonists early plans of keeping some level of peace
with the Natives, as in 1606 when

"the Virginia Company of London instructed its colonists to buy
a stock of corn from the 'naturals' before the English intention to
settle permanently should become evident. The Company's chiefs
were sure that 'you cannot carry yourselves so towards them but
they will grow discontented with your habitation' ". n

The initial English (and Dutch) settlers began the process of purchasing
land, supplemented as always with armed force against vulnerable Indigenous
nations (such as those decimated by disease or already engaged in wars with
more powerful First Nations).

It remains unclear as to what the First Nations understood of the local
purchasing process, but some points are clear; there was no practise of private
ownership of land, nor of selling land, among or between the Peoples prior to
the arrival of the colonialists; there were however agreements and pacts be-
tween First Nations in regards to access to hunting or fishing areas. This would

9 Ibid, pg. 85.
10 Ibid, pg. 33.
"Ibid, pg. 76.

13

indicate treaties were most likely understood as agreements between First Na-
tions and settler communities over use of certain areas of land, as well as non-
aggressiveness pacts. In either case, where First Nations remained powerful
enough to deter initial settler outrages the treaties were of little effect if they
turned out to be less than honourable, and there was enough duplicity, fraud,
and theft contained in the treaties that they could not be considered bind-
ing. Practises such as orally translating one version of a treaty and signing
another on paper were frequent, as was taking European proposals in negotia-
tions and claiming that these had been agreed upon by all — when in fact they
were being negotiated. As well, violations of treaty agreements by settlers was
commonplace, particularly as, for example, the Virginia colony discovered the
profitability of growing tobacco (introduced to the settlers by Native peoples)
and began expanding on their initial land base.

Gradually, First Nations along the Atlantic found themselves dispossessed
of their lands and victims of settler depredations. One of the first conflicts that
seriously threatened to drive the colonialist forces back into the sea broke out in
1622, when the Powhatan Confederacy, led by Opechancanough, attacked the
Jamestown colony. Clashes continued until 1644, when Opechancanough was
captured and killed.

By the mid-1600s, clashes between Natives and settlers began to increase.
Tensions grew as the Europeans became more obtuse and domineering in their
relationship with the First Nations. In 1655 for example, the so-called 'Peach
Wars' erupted between colonialists of New Netherlands and the Delaware Na-
tion when a Dutchman killed a Delaware woman for picking a peach tree on
the colonies 'property'. The settler was subsequently killed and Delaware war-
riors attacked several Dutch settlements. The fighting along the Hudson River
lasted until 1664 when the Dutch forced the Delaware nation into submission
by kidnapping Delaware children as hostages.

In 1675 the Narragansetts, Nipmucs, and Wapanoags, led in part by Meta-
com (also known as King Philip by the Europeans) rebelled against the colonies
of New England following the English arrest and execution of three Wapanoags
for the alleged killing of a Christianized Native, believed to be a traitor. The
war ended in 1676 after the English colonialists making use of Native allies
and informers — were able to defeat the rebellion. Metacom was killed, and
his family and hundreds of others sold to slavers in the West Indies. The mil-
itary campaign carried out by the colonial forces decimated the Narragansett,
Nipmuc, and Wapanoag nations.

Meanwhile in 1680, a Pueblo uprising led in part by the Tewa Medicine man
Pope succeeded in driving out the Spanish from New Mexico. By 1689, Spanish
forces were able to once again subjugate the Pueblos.

By the late 1600s, the competition between European states would dominate
the colonization process in North America.

The European Struggle for Hegemony

Although colonial wars had been fought in the past between France, Spain, The
Netherlands, and England, and conflicts had erupted between their colonies in
the Americas, the late 1680s and the following 100 year period was to be a
time of bitter struggle between the Europeans for domination. This period of

14

European wars was to be played out also in the Americas, "To a great extent,
the battle for colonies and the wealth they produced was the ultimate battlefield
for state power in Europe". 12

Beginning in 1689 with King William's War between the French and the
English, which evolved into Queen Anne's War (1702-13), to King George's
War (1744-48) and culminating in the so-called 'French and Indian War' (1754-
63), the battles for colonial possessions in the Americas mirrored those raging
across Europe in the same period, except that in North American and in the
Caribbean, the European struggle for hegemony in the emerging world trade
market would employ heavy concentrations of Native warriors.

While the British emerged victorious from the 'Great War for Empire', and
the French defeated ceding Hudson Bay, Acadia, New France and other ter-
ritories in a series of treaties, those who were most affected by the European
struggles were the Native peoples of the Atlantic regions. The fallout from those
wars was the virtual extermination of some Indigenous peoples, including the
Apalachccs in Florida, the establishment of colonial military garrisons and out-
posts, a general militarization of the region with heavier armaments and combat
veterans, and the subsequent expansion of colonial settlements, extending their
frontiers and pushing many First Nations further west.

During the period of the colonial wars, Indigenous resistance did not end,
nor was it limited to aiding their respective 'allies'.

In 1711, the Tuscaroras attacked the English in North Carolina and fought
for two years, until the English counter-insurgency campaign left hundreds dead
and some 400 sold into slavery. The Tuscaroras fled north, settling among the
Haudcnosaunee and becoming the Sixth Nation in 1722.

In 1715, the Yamasee nation rose up against the English in South Carolina,
but were virtually exterminated in a ruthless English campaign.

In 1720, the Chickasaw nation warred against French occupation, until
France's capitulation to England in 1763. Similarly, Fox resistance to French
colonialism continued from 1920 to around 1735.

In 1729, the Natchez nation began attacking French settlers in Louisiana af-
ter governor Sieur Chepart ordered their main village cleared for his plantations.
In the ensuing battles, Chepart was killed and the French counter-insurgency
campaign left the Natchez decimated, although guerrilla struggle was to con-
tinue along the Mississippi River.

In 1760 the Cherokee nation began their own guerrilla war against their
'allies' the English, in Virginia and Carolina. Led by Oconostota, the Cherokee
fought for two years, eventually agreeing to a peace treaty which saw partitions
of their land ceded after the English colonial forces had razed Cherokee villages
and crops.

In 1761, Aleuts in Alaska attacked Russian traders following depredations
on Aleut communities off the coast of Alaska (the Russian colonizers eventually
moved into the Pribilof and Aleutian islands in 1797, relocating Aleuts and
virtually enslaving them in the seal hunt).

Against British colonization, the Ottawa leader Pontiac led an alliance of
Ottawas, Algonquins, Senecas, Mingos, and Wyandots in 1763. The offensive
captured nine of twelve English garrisons and laid siege to Detroit for six months.
Unable to expand the insurgency or draw in promised French assistance, Pontiac

12 Ortiz, op. cit.

15

eventually negotiated an end to the conflict in 1766.

Added to this period of warfare was the continuing spread of disease epi-
demics. In 1746 in Nova Scotia alone, 4,000 Micmacs had died of disease.

With the defeat of France, the British had acquired vast regions of formerly
French territory, unbeknownst to the many First Nations who lived on those
lands, and with whom the French never negotiated any land treaties nor recog-
nized any form of Native title.

At this time,

"... the British government seized the opportunity to consolidate
its imperial position by structuring formal, constitutional relations
with. . . natives. In the Proclamation of 1763, it announced its inten-
tion of conciliating those disgruntled tribes by recognizing their land
rights, by securing to them control of unceded land, and by entering
into a nation-to-nation relationship". 13

The Royal Proclamation of 1763 provided for a separate 'Indian Territory'
west of the Appalachians and the original Thirteen Colonies. Within this ter-
ritory there was to be no purchasing of land other than by the crown. In the
colonies now under British control, including Newfoundland, Labrador, Quebec,
Nova Scotia, as well as the Thirteen Colonies, settlers occupying unceded Na-
tive lands were to be removed, and private purchases of lands occupied by or
reserved for Natives was prohibited — these lands could only be purchased by
the crown in the presence of the First Nations.

As grand as these statements were, they were routinely violated by colo-
nialists and rarely enforced. Indeed, one year following the proclamation, Lord
Dunmore — the governor of the Virginia colony — had already breached the de-
marcation line by granting to veterans of the 'French and Indian War' who had
served under him lands which were part of the Shawnee nation. The Shawnee
retaliation was not short in coming, but Dunmore's challenge to British control
was to precipitate in form and substance another period of conflict that would
see the colonization process expand westward. And that period of conflict would
underline the real intent of the Royal Proclamation as a strategic document in
the defense of British colonial interests in North America.

Tragedy: The United States is Created

With the dominance of British power on a world scale, the European struggle
for hegemony in the Americas was Hearing its end. Subsequently, the 18th and
19th centuries were to be a period of wars for independence that would force
the European states out of the Americas. Foremost among these wars was the
independence struggle that would lead to the birth of the United States.

Emerging from the 'Great War for Empire', Britain found itself victorious
but also heavily in debt. To defray the cost of maintaining and defending the
colonies, Britain substantially changed its colonial policies. Large portions of the
financial costs of the colonies were placed directly on the colonies themselves

13 John S. Milloy, "The Early Indian Acts: Developmental Strategy and Constitutional
Change", As Long As The Sun Shines and Water Flows, University of BC Press, 1983, pg.
56.

16

through a series of taxes. The imposition of the taxes incited the settlers to
demand taxes be imposed only with their consent. In fact, the question of taxes
was part of a wider debate; who should control and profit from colonialism, the
colonies or the colonial centres.

By 1775, settler protests and revolts had culminated into a general war for
independence that continued until 1783, when the British capitulated and ceded
large portions of its territories along the Atlantic.

That the British colonial forces did not lose more territory can be attributed
much to the participation of numerous First Nations on the side of the British;
the Royal Proclamation was thus a strategy to dampen Native resistance to
British colonialism (as in the eruption of King George's War in 1744 when
Micmacs allied themselves with the French and, following the Treaty of Aix-la-
Chapcllc in 1748, continued fighting the British, who then concluded a treaty
of "Peace and Friendship" with the Micmacs), as well as a method of forming
military alliances with First Nations, if not at least their neutrality in European
conflicts.

As in previous European struggles, Indigenous peoples were used as expend-
able troops, and the extensive militarization further consolidated settler control,

"The end of the war saw thousands of Whites, United Empire Loyal-
ists, flock to Nova Scotia. They came in such numbers and spread so
widely over the Maritime region that it was considered necessary to
divide Nova Scotia into three provinces to ease administrative prob-
lems; New Brunswick, Cape Breton, Nova Scotia. . . and lie St. -Jean,
soon to be renamed Prince Edward Island". 14

To the south, the rebellious settlers were establishing their newly-created
United States. For the First Nations in this region, the war had been particu-
larly destructive; the colonial rebels had carried out scorched-earth campaigns
against the Shawnee, Delaware, Cherokee, and the Haudcnosaunee (which had
suffered a split with the Oneidas and Tuscaroras allying themselves with the
revolutionaries) .

Here again the Royal Proclamation remained a useful tool in re-enforcing
the British colonial frontier and retaining Native allies,

"Adherence to the principles of the. . . Proclamation. . . remained the
basis of Britain's Indian policy for more than half a century, and
explains the success of the British in maintaining the Indians as allies
in Britain's wars in North America. . . Even when Britain lost much
of its North American territory after 1781, and its Indian allies lost
their traditional lands as a result of their British alliance, the Crown
purchased land from the Indians living within British territory and
gave it to their allies who moved north. . . ". 15

Having consolidated the Thirteen Colonies along the Atlantic seaboard, the
independent United States quickly set about expanding westward, launching
military campaigns to extend the frontiers of settlement.

14 Gcorgc F. G. Stanley, "As Long as the Sun Shines and the Water Flows: An Historical
Comment", ibid. pg. 5-6.

lj John L. Tobias, "Protection, Civilization, Assimilation: An Outline History of Canada's
Indian Policy", ibid. pg. 40.

17

One of the first of these campaigns began in 1790 under the order of Pres-
ident George Washington. Consisting of about 1,100 Pennsylvania, Virginia,
and Kentucky militiamen led by Brigadier General Josiah Harmar, the force
was quickly defeated by a confederacy of Miami, Shawnee, Ojibway, Delaware,
Potawatomi, and Ottawa warriors led by the Miami chief Michikinikwa (Lit-
tle Turtle). A second force was dispatched and defeated in November, 1791.
Finally, in 1794, a large force led by General Anthony Wayne defeated the con-
federacy, now led by Turkey Foot, near the shores of Lake Erie. Warriors who
survived made their way to the British Fort Miami garrison. But the British
— former allies of many of the First Nations in the confederacy during the rev-
olutionary war — refused them shelter, and hundreds were slaughtered at the
gates by Wayne's soldiers. Although the confederacy was essentially broken, the
Miami would continue armed resistance up to 1840.

The 'Indian Wars' launched by the US continued for the next 100 years,
following an cxterminationist policy that was aimed at destroying Native nations
and securing those remnants who survived in (what was then believed) barren
and desolate reserves. Once the People were contained in these Bantustans,
the next step was the destruction of Native culture under the auspices of then-
emerging governmental agencies.

As the US moved to a higher level of war against First Nations, it also began
moving against competing European powers still present in the Americas.

In 1812, using the pretext of Native raids along its northern frontier from
British territories, US forces attempted to invade British North America. Here
again, Britain's colonial policies proved effective; an alliance of Native nations
(who had their own interests in full implementation of the 1763 Proclamation)
and European settlers succeeded in repulsing the US expansion. Among those
who fought against the US invasion were the Native leaders Tecumseh — a
Shawnee chief who worked to form a Native confederacy against the Europeans
(and who argued that no one individual or grouping could sell the lands, as
it belonged to all the Native peoples); Black Hawk — a leader of the Sauk
who would also lead future Native insurgencies; and Joseph Brant — a leader
in the Haudcnosauncc who was rewarded with a large territory by the British
and promptly began selling off partitions to European settlers (in history, he is
regarded as a "hero" by Euro- Americans but a traitor by his people). Tecumseh
was killed in battle in the Battle of Moraviantown in Ontario in 1813.

In 1815, hostilities between Britain and the US were formally ended in the
Treaty of Ghent, though neither the US war on Natives, or Native resistance,
subsided.

Revolutions in the 'New World'

Following the American Revolution, movements for independence began break-
ing out in South and Central America.

Despite the seemingly monolithic appearance of Spanish or Portuguese colo-
nialism in the first three centuries following the European invasion, and despite
the genocidal policies of the conquistadors, Native resistance continued. Partic-
ularly in, for example, the interior region of the Yucatan Peninsula, the lowland
forests of Peru, the Amazon region, and even in the Andean highlands — which
had suffered such a severe depopulation; between 1532 and 1625, the population

18

of the Andean peoples is estimated to have declined from 9 million to 700,000.
In these regions, colonial domination was continually challenged and formed the
base for resistance movements that began even in the 1500s.

Among the first of these revolts was the Vilacabamba rebellion of 1536 led
by Manqu Inka. Although the insurgency was unable to expand and failed to
drive the Spanish out, the rebels were able to establish a "liberated zone" in
the Vilacabamba region of present-day Bolivia for the next three decades. 16
The ending of the initial revolt is recognized as the execution of another leader,
Tupac Amaru I in 1572.

Other major insurgencies also broke out in Ecuador in 1578, 1599, and 1615.
The Itza of Tayasal in the Yucatan Peninsula remained unsubjugated until 1697.

"Europeans found it particularly difficult to establish effective trans-
portation and communication facilities in the forest lowlands of the
Maya area. . . Though the Spaniards achieved formal sovereignty over
Yucatan with relative ease, many local Maya groups successfully re-
sisted effective domination. . .for centuries". 17

Keeping pace with colonial developments in North America, the Spanish
introduced a series of laws in the 17th century known as the Leyes de Indias.
Similar to the later 1763 Proclamation introduced in British North America, the
laws partitioned the Andean region into a 'Republic of Spain' and a 'Republic
of Indians' — each with its own separate courts, laws and rights. The Leyes de
Indias were, "from the point of view of the colonial stat. . . a pragmatic measure
to prevent the extermination of the (Indigenous) labour force. . . ". 18

Despite its seeming "liberalism", forced labour accompanied by tax laws
remained in place, and the regulation was never fully enforced.

In 1742, Juan Santos Atahualpa led an Indigenous resistance movement in
Peru comprised largely of Yanesha (Amuesha) and Ashaninka (Campa) peoples
that fought off Spanish colonization for more than a century

In the 18th century, Indigenous resistance broke out in a major revolt in the
colony of Upper Peru (now Bolivia), led by Jose Gabriel Tupac Amaru.

"Much has been written about the 1780 Indian rebellion led by Jose
Gabriel Tupaq Amaru and his successors; less is known about the
Chayanta and Sikasika revolts which occurred at the same time, the
latter led by Julian Apasa Tupaq Katari. For more than half a cen-
tury, colonial tax laws had provoked a groundswell of protest. . . In
mid-1780, an apparently spontaneous revolt broke out in Macha, in
the province of Chayanta, to free an Indian cacique, Tomas Katari,
jailed after a dispute with local mestizo authorities. . . Then in Novem-
ber 1780, Jose Gabriel Tupaq Amaru led a well-organized rebellion
in Tungasuca, near Cuzco. Julian Apasa Tupaq Katari, an Indian
commoner from Sullkaw (Sikasika) rose up and laid siege to La Paz
from March to October 1781 during which one fourth of the city's
population died. After the defeat in April 1781 of Tupaq Amaru in

16 Silvia Rivera Cusicanqui, "Aymara Past, Aymara Future", Report on the Americas, Vol.
XXV No. 3, pg. 20. 17.

17 John S. Henderson, The World of the Ancient Maya, Cornell University Press, 1981, pg.
32.

18 Sylvia Rivera Cusicanqui, op. cit.

19

Cuzco, the rebellion shifted to Azangaro, where his relatives Andres
and Diego Cristobal led the struggle. Andres successfully laid siege
to Sorata in August of that year, but by November he and Diego
Cristobal were forced to surrender to the Spanish authorities. The
rebellion was crushed by the beginning of 1782". 19

The leaders, perceived or real, were captured and executed; they were quar-
tered, decapitated, or burned alive.

While Indigenous resistance continued and frequently sent shock-waves through-
out the ranks of the colonialists — including Spaniards and Creoles (descendants
of Spanish settlers in the Americas) — the colonies themselves began to expe-
rience movements for independence comprised of Creoles and Mestizos.

The backgrounds to the movements for independence — like in the US -
are found in the oppressive taxation and monopolistic trade laws imposed by the
colonial centers, both of which constrained the economic growth of the colonies.
As well, Creoles were generally by-passed for colonial positions which went to
agents born in Spain.

The first major settler revolt was in 1809 in the colony of Upper Peru (Bo-
livia), which succeeded in temporarily overthrowing Spanish authorities. In
1810 Colombia declared its independence, followed one year later by Venezuela.
In 1816, Argentina declared its independence, and the next year General Jose
de San Martin led troops across the Andes to "liberate Chile and Peru from
the Royalist forces". Wars for independence spread quickly, and Spanish royal-
ist forces lost one colony after another in decisive conflicts, culminating in the
Battle of Ayacucho in 1824 in Peru, which effectively diminished Spain's dom-
ination in the Americas (which was already dampened by Napoleon's invasion
of Spain in the same period) .

Although the independence movements succeeded in overthrowing Spanish
and Portuguese forces, they were led by, and in the interests of, Creole elites —
with the assistance of land-owners and merchants,

"... the revolutions for independent state formation in the Americas
in the late 18th and early 19th centuries must be seen as being
in the mode of European nation-state formation for the purpose of
capitalist development. Although they were anti-'mothcr country',
they were not anti-colonial (just as the formation of Rhodesia and
South Africa as states were not anti-colonial events)". 20

The present-day Confederation of Indigenous Nationalities of Ecuador (CONAIE)
describes the independence of Ecuador, for example, as

"not mcan(ing) any change in our living conditions; it was nothing
more than the passage of power from the hands of the Spaniards to
the hands of the Creoles". 21

As in the US example, the newly-independent states quickly set about con-
solidating their positions politically and militarily and pursuing economic ex-
pansion.

19 Ibid. pg. 21.

2(, Roxannc Dunbar Ortiz, op. cit.

21 Quoted in Les Field, "Ecuador's Pan-Indian Uprising", Report on the Americas, Vol.
XXV No. 3, pg. 41.

20

The result was an eruption of wars between the independent states over
borders, trade, and ultimately for resources. In 1884 the War of the Pacific
began, involving Bolivia, Chile, and Peru in a dispute over access to nitrate re-
source. From 1865-70, Argentina, Brazil, and Uruguay allied themselves against
Paraguay in the bloody War of the Triple Alliance — a war in which Paraguay
lost a large amount of its male population — primarily Guarani.

As in North America, these and other conflicts most adversely affected the
First Nations peoples. The majority of those who died in the War of the Triple
Alliance were Native. As well, the militarization that occurred created large
reserves of well-equipped, combat-experienced troops. In Argentina and Chile,
these military reserves were directed against invading then unsubjugated regions
where Mapuche resistance had persisted for centuries. Between 1865 and 1885,
a militarized frontier existed from which attacks against the Mapuche were
conducted. Tens of thousands of Mapuche were killed, the survivors dispersed
to reservation areas.

In the 1870s, the development of vulcanization in Europe led to an invasion
of the Upper Amazon regions of Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, and Bolivia —
where rubber trees would eventually supply the world market. In the Putumayo
river region of northern Peru and Colombia alone, 40,000 Natives were killed
between 1886 and 1919 (by 1920, it's estimated that the depopulation of the
rubber areas had reached 95% in some areas). 22

It was in this post-independence period that — arising from the complete
transition from Feudalism to capitalism in Europe — new forms of European
domination were being introduced. Briefly, this consisted of the introduction
of bank loans directed primarily at developing infrastructures for the export
of raw and manufactured materials: roads, railways, and ports, particularly
in the mining and agricultural industries. In the 1820s, English banks loaned
over 21 million pounds to former Spanish colonies. Through the debts, and the
subsequent import of European technology and machinery necessary for large-
scale mining and agribusiness — necessary to begin repayment of the loans —
dependence was gradually established (and continues today in the form of the
International Monetary Fund and the World Bank, controlled by the G-7 23 ).

During the same period, the US was also setting footholds in the region. In
1853, five years after gold was discovered in previously unknown areas in Cen-
tral America, US marines invaded Nicaragua. In 1898, following the Spanish-
American War, Puerto Rico and Cuba were annexed to the US (Puerto Rico
remains today as the last US colonial nation). As well, US forces occupied
the Philippines — carrying out massacres of men, women, and children — and
Hawaii came under US control in 1893. With these actions the US established
itself as an emerging capitalist power, and the eventual extent of US imperialism
was beginning to take shape.

On a global scale, the development of imperialism had now established itself
internationally; the full division of the world between predominantly European
powers and the US was complete (and would subsequently lead to two world

22 Andrew Gray, The Amerindians of South America, Minority Rights Group Report No.
15, London 1987, pg. 8.

23 G-7: the grouping of the seven most advanced industrialized countries consisting of
Britain, Canada, Prance, Italy, Germany, Japan, and the USA. The G-7 meet annually to
determine world economic policies; together they hold dominant positions in the world eco-
nomic order.

21

wars).

Manifest Destiny and the US 'Indian Wars'

While the US was in the process of establishing itself as an imperialist world
power, it was still struggling to consolidate itself as a continental base and
countering armed resistance by First Nations.

Prior to the US-British War of 1812, Louisiana was purchased from France,
in 1803, and Spain had ceded Florida in 1819. By 1824, the Bureau of Indian
Affairs was organized as part of the War Department. Military campaigns were
launched against First Nations, from the Shawnee of the Mississippi Valley to
the Seminole in Florida. At the same time, the legalistic instruments for occupa-
tion were being introduced. In 1830 the Indian Removal Act was implemented,
and in 1834 Congress reorganized the various departments dealing with Indian
repression by creating the US Department of Indian Affairs, and the Indian
Trade and Intercourse Act which redefined the 'Indian Territory' and 'Perma-
nent Indian Frontier'. The 'Indian Territory' had been previously defined in
1825 as lands west of the Mississippi. Following the formation of the territories
of Wisconsin and Iowa, the frontier was extended from the Mississippi to the
95th meridian.

The Indian Removal Act was directed at forced relocation of Natives east
of the 95th meridian to the west of it. In 1838, US troops forced thousands
of Cherokee into concentration camps, from which they were forced westward
on the Trail of Tears. In the midst of winter, one out of every four Cherokees
died from cold, hunger, or diseases. Many other nations were forcibly relocated:
the Choctaws, Chickasaws, Creeks, Shawnees, Miamis, Ottawas, Wendats and
Dcla wares. The 'Permanent Indian Frontier' was a militarized line of US gar-
risons, similar to that in Argentina and Chile during the same period.

But the 'Indian Frontier' was not to hold. Like the British Royal Proclama-
tion of 1763, the restrictions on Europeans settling or trading in these regions
were routinely ignored. With the US annexation of northern Mexico in 1848,
the US acquired the territories of Texas, California, New Mexico, Arizona, Utah
and Colorado. The same year, gold was discovered in California. With these
two events, the large-scale invasion of the 'Indian Territory' was underway. Un-
der the ideology of Manifest Destiny, the US was to launch a renewed period
of genocidal war against those regions and First Nations which remained un-
subjugated. The theatre of war extended from the Great Lakes region around
Minnesota, south of the Rio Grande, and west to California, extending north to
Washington state. It was a period of war which involved many First Nations:
the Lakota, Cheyenne, Commanche, Kiowa, Yakima, Nez Perce, Walla Walla,
Cayuse, Arapaho, Apache, Navajo, Shoshone, Kickapoos, and many others. It
was also a war from which many Native leaders would leave a legacy of struggle
that, like those struggles in South and Mesoamerica, would remain as symbols of
resistance to the European colonization: Crazy Horse, Tatanka Yotanka (Sitting
Bull), Ten Bears, Victorio, Geronimo, Quanah Parker, Wovoka, Black Kettle,
Red Cloud, Chief Joseph, and so many others.

Although the 'Indian Wars' of this period were by no means one-sided — the
US forces suffered many defeats — the US colonial forces succeeded in gradually
and ruthlessly gaining dominance. Various factors contributed to this, follow-

22

ing the patterns of previous campaigns against Native peoples: the continuing
spread of diseases such as measles, smallpox, and cholera (between 1837-70,
at least four major smallpox epidemics swept through the western plains, and
between 1850-60 a cholera epidemic hit the Great Basin and southern plains);
the use of informers and traitors; and the overwhelming strength of US forces
in both weaponry and numbers of soldiers. Combined with outright treachery
and policies of extermination, these factors continued to erode the strength of
once-powerful First Nations.

One of the major turning points in this period can be seen as the US Civil
War.

Afrikan Slavery, Afrikan Rebellion, and the US
Civil War

Ostensibly a moral crusade to "abolish slavery", the US Civil War of 1861-65
was in reality a conflict between the commercial and industrial development of
the North against the agrarian stagnation based on Afrikan peoples' slave-labour
of the South.

By the 19th century, 10 to 15 million Afrikan peoples had been relocated to
the Americas by first Portuguese, then English, Spanish, and US colonialists.
These peoples came from all regions of Afrika: Senegal, the Ivory Coast, An-
gola, Mozambique, etc. — and from many Afrikan Nations: the Yoruba, Kissi,
Senefu, Foulah, Fons, Adjas, and many others.

Enslaved, these peoples were forced to labour in the mines, textile mills,
factories, and plantations that served first the European markets and, after the
wars for independence, the newly-created nation-states of the Americas.

The slave-trade in both American and Afrikan Indigenous peoples was ab-
solutely necessary for the European colonization of the Americas. The forced
relocation of millions of Afrikan peoples also introduced new dynamics into the
colonization process; not only in the economics of European occupation, but
also in the development of Afrikan peoples' resistance.

As early as 1526, Afrikan slaves had rebelled in a short-lived Spanish colony
in South Carolina, and after their escape took refuge amongst First Nations
peoples. In the Caribbean and South America, where Afrikan slavery was first
centered, large revolts frequently broke out and escaped Afrikan slaves took
refuge amongst Caribs and Arawaks. In Northeast Brazil, an Afrikan rebellion
succeeded in organizing the territory of Palmares — which grew to one-third
the size of Portugal.

Probably one of the most famous Afrikan and Native alliances was the ex-
ample of the escaped Afrikan slaves and the Seminole in Florida. The escaped
Afrikans had "formed liberated Afrikan communities as a semi-autonomous
part of the sheltering Seminole Nation". 24 Together, these two peoples would
carry out one of the strongest resistance struggles against the US. The so-called
Seminole Wars began in 1812 when Georgia vigilantes attempted to recapture
Afrikans for enslavement, and continued for thirty years under the US campaign
of relocations. The Seminole Wars, under the fanatical direction of President
Jackson, were the most costly of the US 'Indian Wars'; over 1,600 US soldiers

24 J. Sakai, Settlers: The Myth of the White Proletariat, Morningstar Press, 1989, pg. 27.

23

were killed and thousands wounded at the cost of some $30 million. Even af-
ter this, the Seminole- Afrikan guerrillas remained unsubjugated. The solidarity
between the Afrikans and the Scminoles is most clear in the second Seminole
War of 1835. The Seminoles, under Osceola, refused to accept relocation to
Oklahoma — one of the key disagreements also being the US insistence on sep-
aration of the Afrikans from their Seminole brothers and sisters. The US forces
relaunched their war, and were never able to achieve a clear victory.

By the mid-1800s, slavery was viewed by some parts of the US ruling class as
an obstacle to economic growth and expansion. The anti-slavery campaign, led
by the North, was a practical effort to free land and labour from the limitations
of the closed system of plantation agriculture based on slave labour;

"Slavery had become an obstacle to both the continued growth of
settler society and the interests of the Euro-Amerikan bourgeoisie.
It was not that slavery was unprofitable itself. It was, worker for
worker, much more profitable than white wage-labour. Afrikan
slaves in industry cost the capitalists less than one-third the wages of
white workingmcn. . . But the American capitalists needed to greatly
expand their labour force. While the planters believed that import-
ing new millions of Afrikan slaves would most profitably meet this
need, it was clear that this would only add fuel to the fires of the al-
ready insurrectionary Afrikan colony. Profit had to be seen not only
in the squeezing of a few more dollars on a short-term, individual
basis, but in terms of the needs of an entire Empire and its future.
And it was not just the demand for labour alone that outmoded the
slave system. Capitalism needed giant armies of settlers, waves and
waves of new European shock-troops to help conquer and hold new
territory, to develop it for the bourgeoisie and garrison it against the
oppressed". 25

The "insurrectionary fires" had already dealt the occupation forces a shock-
ing blow in 1791 in the Haitian Revolution. Afrikan slaves, led in part by Tous-
saint L'Ouvcrture, rebelled and defeated Spanish, English, and French forces, es-
tablishing the Haitian Republic that offered citizenship to any Native or Afrikan
peoples who wanted it.

There were also increasing revolts within the US, including the 1800 revolt
in Virginia led by Gabriel Prosser, and Nat Turner's revolt in 1831 which killed
sixty settlers.

"The situation became more acute as the developing capitalist econ-
omy created trends of urbanization and industrialization. In the
early 1800s the Afrikan population of many cities was rising faster
than that of Euro- Americans". 26

The revolts led by Gabriel and Turner had caused discussions in the Vir-
ginia legislature on ending slavery, and public rallies had been held in Western
Virginia demanding an all-white Virginia.

Combined, these factors led the North to agitate for an end to slavery as
one specific form of exploitation. In turn, the Southern states, led by plantation
owners and slavers, threatened to secede from the Union. The Civil War began.

25 Ibid, pg. 25.
26 Ibid, pg. 31.

24

Black Reconstruction and Deconstruction

The beginning of the US Civil War in 1861 posed various problems for the
northern Union ruling class. Not only was the war for the preservation of an
expanding continental empire, but it also opened up a second front: that of
a liberation struggle by enslaved Afrikan peoples. With a population of four
million, the rising of these Afrikans in the South proved crucial in the defeat
of the Confederacy. By the tens of thousands, Afrikan slaves escaped from the
slavers and enlisted in the Union forces. This massive withdrawal of slave-labour
hit the Southern economy hard, and the Northern forces were bolstered by the
thousands.

Towards the end of the War in 1865, those Afrikans who did not escape
began a large-scale strike following the defeat of the Confederacy They claimed
the lands that they had laboured on, and began arming themselves — not only
against the Southern planters but also against the Union army. Widespread con-
cerns about this 'dangerous position' of Afrikans in the South led to 'Black Re-
construction'; Afrikans were promised "democracy, human rights, self-government
and popular ownership of the land".

In reality, it was a strategy for returning Euro- American dominance involv-
ing:

"1. The military repression of the most organized and militant
Afrikan communities.

2. Pacifying the Afrikan peoples by nco-colonialism, using elements
of the Afrikan petit-bourgeoisie to led their people into embracing
US citizenship as the answer to all problems. Instead of nationhood
and liberation, the neo-colonial agents told the masses that their
democratic demands could be met by following the Northern settler
capitalists. . . ". 27

Following this strategy, Union army forces attacked Afrikan communities
who were occupying land, forcing tens of thousands off collectively held land
and arresting the "leaders". Afrikan troops who had fought in the Union army
were quickly disarmed and dispersed, or sent to fight as colonial troops in the
ongoing "Indian Wars". White supremacist terrorist organizations formed, one
of the most infamous — but not the only — being the Ku Klux Klan.

Under the 14th Amendment to the US Constitution, Afrikans became US
citizens, including the right to vote. Through the neo-colonialist strategy of
Reconstruction, Afrikans were able to push through reforms including integrated
juries, protective labour reforms, divorce and property rights for women, and
an involvement in local government.

However, even these small reforms were too much for Southern Whites. Re-
construction was vigorously resisted — not only by former slaves and planters
but also by poor Whites who flocked to organizations such as the KKK, White
Caps, White Cross, and the White League. Thousands of Afrikans were killed
during state elections as the White supremacist groups conducted terrorist cam-
paigns aimed at countering the gains of Reconstruction and preserving White
supremacy.

27 Ibid, pg. 39.

25

"In 1876-77, the final accommodation between Northern capital and
the Southern planters was reached in the 'Hayes-Tilden deal'. The
South promised to accept the dominance of the Northern bourgeoisie
over the entire Empire, and to permit the Republican candidate
Rutherford B. Hayes to succeed Grant in the US Presidency. In
return, the Northern bourgeoisie agreed to let the planters have re-
gional hegemony over the South, and to withdraw the last of the
occupying Union troops so that the Klan could take care of the
Afrikans as they wished. While the guarded remnants of Recon-
struction held out here and there for some years (Afrikan Congress-
men were elected from the South until 1895), the critical year of
1877 marked their conclusive defeat". 28

Not insignificantly during this same period, Northern working class Whites
were engaged in a vicious class struggle for an 8 hour work day, even as Afrikans
were under attack by the KKK and other racist organizations. And, at the same
time, little notice was made of the military extermination campaigns being
carried out against Native peoples.

During the War, many First Nations attempted to remain "neutral" in the
South, although some promises by the Confederacy for land stimulated some
First Nations to side with the South. But "neutrality" is not the same as passive;
Native peoples continued their own resistance to colonization. From 1861-63
the Apaches led by Cochise and Mangas Colorado fought occupation forces, a
resistance that would continue until 1886 when Geronimo was captured. The
Santee also engaged the US military from 1862-63 led by Little Crow. In 1863-
64, this war would shift to North Dakota under the Teton. In 1863, the Western
Shoshone fought settlers and attacked military patrols and supply routes in Utah
and Idaho. That same year, the Navajo rebelled in New Mexico and Arizona.

With the completion of the transcontinental railroad in 1869, settlement of
the West increased rapidly. The militarization from the Civil War, and the
ability to supply and facilitate large-scale military operations, opened up the
final period in the "Indian Wars". In the post-Civil War period, the genocidal
process of colonization was to enter a new phase, even at the price of thousands
of US troops dead and wounded, and each dead Indian coming at the price of $1
million. By 1885, the last great herd of buffalo would be slaughtered by Euro-
American hunters — this also forming a part of the counter-insurgency strategy
of depriving the Plains Indians of their primary food source. Five years later,
350 Lakotas would be massacred at Chankpe Opi Wakpala, the creek called
Wounded Knee.

The Colonization of Canada

In contrast to the US campaign of extermination, the colonization process in
Canada lacked the large-scale military conflicts that characterized the US "In-
dian Wars". Although many Euro-Canadians 29 would like to believe that these
differences in colonization lie in fundamentally different values, cultures, etc.,

28 Ibid, pg. 41.

29 Euro-Canadian: a term used to distinguish between descendants of Europeans in the US
and those in Canada.

26

they arc no more than the result of differences in colonial practises rooted in
basic economic needs and strategies. As can be seen in the aftermath of the US
War for Independence, there followed a period of rapid expansion and settle-
ment. Following the consolidation of the "13 British colonies along the North
Atlantic, and armed with a pre-imperialist thrust (the Monroe Doctrine and
the ideology of 'manifest destiny'), the entrepreneurs controlling the new state
machinery dispatched their military forces rapidly across North America". 30

Canada, on the other hand, did not fight a war for independence and re-
mained firmly a part of the British Empire.

As previously discussed, the first major colonization of what would become
eastern "Canada" was carried out by France. Between 1608 and 1756, some
10,000 French settlers had arrived in Canada. The "French and Indian Wars"
of the 18th century resulted in the defeat of the French forces; the subsequent
Treaty of 1763 established British rule over New France (now Quebec). With the
Quebec Act of 1774, the province of Quebec was expanded, British criminal law
established, and the feudal administration implemented by France remained
largely unchanged. Conflicts related to civil matters and property remained
regulated under French civil law. The seigneurial system, a feudal system in
which the land of the province was given in grant from the King to seigneurs
(usually lower nobility and from the Church), who, in turn, rented the land to
peasants in return for an annual rent (called tithes, payable in goods of products
raised on the land), was continued. As with the 1763 Royal Proclamation, the
Quebec act secured the loyalty of the French clergy and aristocracy in the US
War for Independence.

As a result of the wars of the 18th century, French settlement had grown
to 60,000 as soldiers employed by France swelled the French population. The
expansion of the province under the Quebec Act had seized a large portion of
the "Indian territory" and placed it under Crown jurisdiction. Following the
US War for Independence, some 40,000 loyalists fled the former British colonies
and settled in Canada, occupying more Native lands — particularly that of the
Haudcnosaunce. British colonial authorities went to some lengths to acquire
land while placating the still geo-militarily important Indians. 31

While the colonialists were busy consolidating the administration of "British
North America", the Pacific Northwest was coming under increased reconnais-
sance.

Beginning in 1774, the first recorded colonizers into the area of British
Columbia came aboard the Spanish ship Santiago. Four years later, an expedi-
tion led by James Cook descended upon the area, leading to the establishment
of a large and profitable fur trade. The dominance of the fur trade would last
until around 1854 when European settlement began to increase rapidly along
with the mining and logging industries. As a result of the early dominance of
the fur trade, which relied on Native collaboration, British colonizers curtailed

30 Ortiz, op. cit.

31 Negotiations with the Mississaugas of southern Ontario were conducted as early as 1781,
providing land for communities from the Haudcnosaunce, whose lands were supplied to British
loyalists in a strategic defensive line along the US border. Between 1781 and 1836, 23 such
land cessions were conducted. Not treaties but instead "simple real estate deals" in which
the British paid with goods and later money. In 1818 the practise was adopted of paying
annuities. By 1830 these annual payments were directed at building houses and purchasing
farm equipment — in line with changing colonial practises. "This was then followed by the
establishment of the band fund system", see As Long as the Sun Shines, op. cit., pg. 9.

27

their military operations. Nevertheless, conflicts did erupt, primarily against
British depredations. As more ships frequented the area, clashes spread with
attacks on colonial vessels and the shelling of Native villages.

Even before European settlement in BC, the impact of the traders was disas-
trous. For example, from 1835 when the first census was taken of the Kwakwaka-
wakw nation, to 1885, there was between a 70 to 90 percent reduction in popula-
tion (from around 10,700 to 3, 000). 32 In an all too familiar pattern, the intrusion
of European traders had set into motion disease epidemics, even as early as the
1780s and '90s. In 1836, a smallpox epidemic hit the northern coast, and the
fur trade was "depressed all that winter and the following spring". 33 Following
an invasion of gold hunters into the region in 1858, one of the most devastating
epidemics struck in 1862, killing at least 20,000 Indians. 34

Meanwhile, in British North America, the geo-military importance of the
First Nations was quickly being eroded. With the influx of loyalists after the
US War for Independence, the European population had grown and was strate-
gically garrisoned in key military areas — conflicts with the US were predicted.
As well as further increasing the European population in the region, the War
of 1812 and US policies of moving Natives from the northern frontier had bro-
ken up confederacies and greatly diminished the power of the First Nations in
the area. After this, British colonial policies changed from essentially forming
military alliances to a higher level of colonization through policies of breaking
down the collective power of First Nations. Christianization and an overall Eu-
ropeanization of Native peoples was developed as official policy. By the 1850s,
an instrument had been created to this end: "The Gradual Civilization Act of
1857".

"The Act was based upon the assumption that the full civilization
of the tribes could be achieved only when Indians were brought into
contact with individualized property. . . Any Indian. . . adjudged by
a special board of examiners to be educated, free from debt, and
of good moral character could on application be awarded twenty
hectares of land. . . ". 35

Here, the "civilization of the tribes" should be read as the elimination of the
basis of Native cultures and de facto the First Nations as nations. The twenty
hectares of land was to be taken from the reserve land base, subsequently break-
ing up the collective and communitarian land practises of Native peoples and
replacing these with individual parcels of land; all the easier, from the view-
point of the colonizer, to achieve the long-term goal of completely eliminating
First Nations as nations and leaving nothing but dispersed, acculturated, peo-
ples to be assimilated into European society. The patriarchal dimensions of
forced-assimilation were also clear: only males could be so enfranchised. 36 A
Commission of Inquiry had further recommended that reserve lands be restricted

32 Dara Culhanc Speck, An Error in Judgement, Talonbooks, Vancouver 1987, pg. 72.

33 Wilson Duff, The Indian History of BC, Vol. 1: The Impact of the White Man, Anthro-
pology in BC, Memoir No. 5, 1964. BC Provincial Museum, Victoria 1965 (First Edition),
pg. 42.

34 Ibid, pg. 42.43.

35 John S. Milloy, op. cit., pg. 58.

36 Kathlcen Jamieson, Indian Women and the Law in Canada: Citizens Minus, Advisory
Council on the Status of Women, Indian Rights for Indian Women, Canada 1978, pg. 27-28.

28

to a maximum of 25 acres per family, and that Native organization be gradually
replaced with a municipal form of government.

At the same time, new methods in acquiring land were developed. Beginning
on 1850 and continuing into the 20th century, a series of treaties were "negoti-
ated" in which Native nations ceded immense tracts of land in return for reserve
land, hunting and fishing rights, education, medical care, and the payment of
annuities. The first such treaties were the Robinson treaties, which would be
renegotiated in 1871 as Treaties No. 1 and No. 2.

"The relationship between the immediate requirements of the in-
ternal imperialist expansion and the treaties is remarkable. The
first of these treaties was sought, according to a 19th century histo-
rian's first-hand report, 'in consequence of the discovery of minerals
on the shores of Lake Huron and Superior'. . .The prairie treaties
were obtained immediately in advance of agricultural settlement,
and the treaty which includes parts of the Northwest Territories was
negotiated immediately upon the discovery of oil in the Mackenzie
Valley". 37

While the colonizers knew what they wanted in proposing the treaties, Native
peoples were unprepared for the duplicity and dishonour of the treaty-seekers.
When a commission journeyed to the Northwest Territories to investigate un-
fulfilled provisions of Treaties 8 and 11, they found that

"At a number of meetings, Indians who claimed to have been present
at the time when the Treaties were signed stated that they definitely
did not recall hearing about the land entitlement in the Treaties.
They explained that poor interpreters were used and their chiefs
and head men had signed even though they did not know what the
Treaties contained". 38

The treaties were important aspects of the plan for the expansion of Canada
westward and economic development based on resource extraction and agricul-
ture. Indeed, the Confederation of Canada in the British North America Act of
1867 was aimed primarily at consolidating the then-existing eastern provinces
and facilitating in this westward expansion; the primary instruments seen as a
trans-Canada railway, telegraph lines, and roads. Expansion as seen not only
as economically necessary but also politically urgent as the US was expanding
westward at the same time.

The invasion of the prairie regions was not without conflict. The most sig-
nificant resistance in this period was that of the Metis peoples — descendants of
primarily French and Scottish settlers and Cree — in what would become Mani-
toba. The Red River Rebellion, also known as the First Riel rebellion after Louis
Ricl, a Metis leader, erupted following an influx of Euro-Canadian settlers and
the purchase of the territory from the controlling Hudsons Bay Company, by the

37 Donald R. Colborne, Norman Ziotkin, "Internal Canadian Imperialism and the Native
People", Imperialism, Nationalism, and Canada, Marxist Institute of Toronto, Between the
Lines and New Hogtown Press 1987, pg. 164.

38 Ibid, pg. 167. Quote from Report of the Commission appointed to investigate the unful-
filled provisions of Treaties 8 and 11 as they apply to the Indians of the Mackenzie District,
1959, pgs. 3-4.

29

government of Canada. The rebellion was directed against the annexation of
the territory over the Metis — who numbered some 10,000 in the region. A force
of 400 armed Metis seized a small garrison and demanded democratic rights for
the Metis in the Confederation. The following year the Manitoba Act made the
territory a province. However, fifteen years later in 1885 the Metis along with
hundreds of Cree warriors under the chiefs Big Bear and Opetecahanawaywin
(Poundmaker) were again engaged in widespread armed resistance against col-
onization. For almost four months the resistance continued against thousands
of government troops which, unlike in 1870, were no transported quickly and
en masse on the new Canadian Pacific railway. After several clashes the Metis
and Cree warriors were eventually defeated; the Cree and Metis guerrillas im-
prisoned, killed in battles or executed. Another Metis leader, Gabriel Dumont,
escaped to the US.

The Metis and Cree resistance of 1885 was the final chapter of armed re-
sistance in the 19th century. However, the use of military force in controlling
Native peoples was already being bypassed by the Indian Act of 1876, itself a
reaffirmation and expansion on previous legislation concerning Native peoples.
This Act, with subsequent additions and changes, remains the basis of Native
legislation in Canada today.

Under the Indian Act, the federal government through its Department of
Indian Affairs is given complete control over the economic, social, and politi-
cal affairs of Native communities. More than just a legislative instrument to
administer "Indian affairs", the Indian Act was and is an attack on the very
foundations of the First Nations as nations. Besides restricting hunting and
fishing, criminalizing independent economic livelihood (ic. in 1881 the Act made
it illegal for Natives to "sell, barter or traffic fish"), the Act also declared who
was and who was not an Indian, it removed "Indian status" from Native women
who married a non-Native, and criminalized vital aspects of Native organiza-
tion and culture such as the potlatch, the sun-dance, and pow-wow. Everything
that formed the political, social, and economic bases of Native societies was
restricted; the culture was attacked because it stood as the final barrier of re-
sistance to European colonization. In the area of political organization,

"The Indian Act (of 1880) created a new branch of the civil service
that was to be called the Department of Indian Affairs. It once again
empowered the superintendent general to impose the elective system
of band government. . . In addition, this new legislation allowed the
superintended general to deprive the traditional leaders of recogni-
tion by stating that the only spokesmen of the band were those men
elected according to. . . the Indian Act". 39

In 1894, amendments to the Act authorized the forced relocation of Native
children to residential boarding schools, which were seen as superior to schools
on the reserves because it removed the children from the influence of the Native
community. Isolated children in the total control of Europeans were easier
to break; Native languages were forbidden and all customs, values, religious
traditions and even clothing were to be replaced by European forms. Sexual
and physical abuse were common characteristics of these schools, and their

39 John L. Tobias, op. cit., pg. 46.

30

effects have been devastatingly effective in partially acculturating generations
of Native peoples.

The Indian Act followed earlier legislation in that the long-term objective
was the assimilation of Christianized Natives, gradually removing any "special
status" for Native peoples and eliminating reserves and treaty rights; all of which
would make the complete exploitation of the land a simple task. As part of this
strategy of containing and repressing Native peoples who did not assimilate,
and who were thus an obstacle to the full expansion of Canada, the Indian Act
also denied the right to vote to Native peoples and implemented a pass system
similar if not the forerunner to the Pass Laws in the Bantustans of South Africa
(it should also be noted that Asian peoples were denied the right to vote as well
and were subjected to viciously racist campaigns in BC by both the government
and the labour movement; only in 1950 were Native and Asian peoples given
this "illustrious" right).

Extermination — Assimilation: Two Methods,
One Goal

In the early 1900s, the population of Native peoples in North America had
reached their lowest point. In the US alone this population had declined to
some 250,000. As in Canada, Native peoples had been consigned to largely
desolate land areas and the process of assimilation began through government
agencies such as the Bureau of Indian Affairs. Here too, residential schools,
criminalization of Native cultures, and control of political and economic systems
were the instruments used. Native peoples, like those in Canada, were viewed
as obstacles to be crushed in the drive for profits.

In both countries, resistance to this assimilation continued in various forms:
potlatches and sun-dances were continued in clandestinity and the elected band
councils opposed. As well, Native peoples began forming organizations to work
against government polices. In 1912, the Alaska Native Brotherhood was formed
by the Tlingit and Tsimshian at Sikta. That same year, the Nishga Land Claims
Petition was presented to the Canadian government concerning the recognition
of aboriginal title; no treaties had or have been signed with First Nations in BC
— with the exception of a north-eastern corner of BC included in Treaty No.
8 and some minor treaties on Vancouver Island. Yet Natives in BC had found
themselves dispossessed of their territory and subjected to the Indian Act. In
1916 the Nishga joined with the interior Salish and formed another inter-tribal
organization, the Allied Tribes of BC. Funds were raised, meetings held, and
petitions sent to Ottawa. In 1927, a special Joint Committee of the Senate and
House of Commons found that Natives had "not established any claim to the
lands of BC based on aboriginal or other title". 40 That same year Section 141
was added to the Indian Act prohibiting "raising money and prosecuting claims
to land or retaining a lawyer".

While the European nations would lead the world into two great wars for
hegemony, political instability and economic depredations formed the general
pattern in South and Central America. Military regimes backed by US and
British imperialism carried out genocidal policies and severe repression against

40 Quoted in Wilson Duff, op. cit., p. 69.

31

Indigenous peoples. As in North America, Indigenous peoples were consigned
to desolate reserve lands where the state or missionaries retained control over
political, economic, social and cultural systems. However, in contrast to the
colonization of North America, where Native peoples were viewed as irrelevant
to economic expansion, the Indians of South and Central America remained as
substantial sources of exploited labour. With the large-scale investments from
the imperialist centres in the form of loans, the export of primary resources
took priority. The "rubber boom" was one example, where tens of thousands
of Indians died in forced labour, relocations, and massacres carried out by large
"land owners", companies, and hired death squads.

"In the wake of the rubber boom, Colombia, Ecuador and Peru
became battlegrounds for a war between oil companies. Subsidiaries
of Shell and Exxon fought for exploration rights in the Amazon, even
to the extent of becoming involved in a border war between Ecuador
and Peru in 1941. . .In Brazil. . .87 Indian groups were wiped out
in the first half of the 20th century from contact with expanding
colonial frontiers — especially rubber and mining in the northwest,
cattle in the northeast, agriculture in the south and east, and from
road building throughout all regions". 41

While policies of forced assimilation were occasionally articulated, military
and paramilitary forces were to remain an essential part of controlling Native
communities and opening up territories to exploitation. The most violent man-
ifestation of this repression came in El Salvador in 1932, where as many as
30,000 people, primarily Indian peasants, were massacred following an upris-
ing against the military dictatorship that took power the year prior. While
the massacres were carried out under the guise of "anti-communism", US and
Canadian naval vessels stood offshore, and US Marines in Nicaragua were put
on alert. However, "It was found unnecessary for the US. . . and British forces to
land" the US Chief of Naval Operations would testify before Congress, "as the
Salvadoran government had the situation in hand". 42 During the same period
in Colombia, the Indian leader Quintin Lame helped initiate struggles for land
and developed an Indigenous philosophy of resistance; in the early 1980s, his
legacy would live on in the Indian guerrilla group "Commando Quintin Lame".
Gonzalo Sanchez was another leader who helped organize the Supreme Council
of Indians in Natagaima, Colombia, in 1920.

After World War 2, significant changes in the world capitalist economy would
see increased penetration of the Amazon and other lowland forest regions in
South America. In the post- War period, the US emerged in a dominant position
in the world economy and would subsequently move to open up markets for
economic expansion. In Western Europe and Japan, as part of the Marshall
Plan, some $30 billion in loans and aid was pumped into the economies to
rebuild these countries as US markets and, not insignificantly, as a base of
containment against the USSR (military alliances were also created through
NATO and SEATO, positioned against the East Bloc).

South and Central America were to be brought firmly under US control, a
process begun during the early 1900s as the US moved to replace Britain as

41 Andrew Gray, op. cit., pg. 8.

42 Quoted in Noam Chomsky, Turning the Tide: The US and Latin America, Black Rose
Books, Montreal 1987, pg. 44.

32

the dominant imperialist nation in the region, even paying off debts owned to
Britain. As part of the US post-War plans, South and Central America would
also receive billions of dollars in direct financial aid from the US and from pri-
vate transnational banks. This aid allowed the "underdeveloped" countries to
industrialize by importing modern technology from the US (in fact, as part of
US financial aid, the loans had to be spent in the US). The enormous debts
incurred in this process guaranteed dependence and opened up these countries
to multinational corporations. As well, international organizations such as the
World Bank, International Bank for Reconstruction and Development, and the
Agency for International Development (AID) were formed to provide multi-
lateral funding aimed largely at the agro-export sectors, resource extraction,
hydro-electric projects and infrastructure (roads, communications, etc.) neces-
sary for the development of those industries. Linked to this "aid" scheme is the
International Monetary Fund, which doesn't fund specific projects but instead
steps in with balance of payments support when a country is unable to pay its
debts.

These projects and the overall industrialization opened up areas for further
exploitation; penetration of areas such as the Amazon and large-scale expro-
priations accelerated in the 1960s, further devastating Indigenous peoples and
leading to renewed campaigns of extermination.

Of course, all this economic restructuring did not occur without growing
resistance. With growing movements against imperialism, including peasant
unions, students, workers, guerrillas and Indians, a substantial part of the "aid"
included military training, weapons, and equipment. US Special Forces troopers
were not only in Southeast Asia, they were also quite busy in Central America,
training death squads and directing massacres. As part of an overall counter-
insurgency campaign, the militarization alone precipitated an upward spiral
of violence. In Guatemala alone, between 1966-68, some 8,000 people were
slaughtered by Guatemalan soldiers under the direction of US Green Beret advi-
sors; US pilots flew US planes on bombing missions. Paramilitary groups/death
squads hunted down "subversives" in collaboration with the government, mil-
itary, multinationals, and land-owners. The main targets of this campaign,
dubbed "Operation Guatemala", were the Mayan peoples.

Another aspect of the counter-insurgency plans was that of population con-
trol. Primarily the focus of US state-funding, the Agency for International
Development (AID) was established in 1961. Using the false pretext of an
"over-population problem" being the cause of mass poverty and starvation —
instead of imperialism — population control came to be championed as the
most important dilemma facing the "modern world". Under the guise of "family
planning", AID began funding for a wide-range of public and private orga-
nizations, foundations, and churches who provided training, equipment, and
clinics for birth control programs. Between 1968 and 1972, "funds earmarked
for population programs through legislation and obligated by AID amounted to
more than $250 million". 44 South America received the largest percentage of
this funding. Besides educational material, birth control pills, IUDs, and other
pharmaceuticals developed by a profitable gene and biotechnology industry in

43 Tom Barry, Deb Preusch, and Beth Wood, Dollars and Dictators, Grove Press Inc., New
York 1983, pg. 122.

44 Bonnie Mass, The Political Economy of Population Control in Latin America, Editions
Latin America, Montreal 1972, pg. 8.

33

the imperialist centres, the main thrust of population control remains steril-
ization. Between 1965-71, an estimated 1 million women in Brazil had been
sterilized. 45 In Puerto Rico, 34% of all women of child-bearing age had been
sterilized by 1965. 46 Between 1963-65, more than 40,000 women in Colombia
had been sterilized. 47 In contrast to these programs in the "Third World", the
imperialist centres see restrictions on abortion and struggles for women's re-
productive choice. But even here there is a double standard for non-European
women:

"Lee Brightman, United Native Americans President, estimates that
of the Native population of 800,000 (in the US), as many as 42% of
the women of childbearing age and 10% of the men. . . have been
sterilized. . . The first official inquiry into the sterilization of Native
women. . . by Dr. Connie Uri. . . reported that 25,000 Indian women
had been permanently sterilized within Indian Health Services facil-
ities alone through 1975. . .

"According to a 1970 fertilization study, 20% of married Black women
had been sterilized, almost three times the percentage of white mar-
ried women. There was a 180% rise in the number of sterilizations
performed during 1972-73 in New York City municipal hospitals
which serve predominantly Puerto Rican neighbourhoods". 48

Similar results were found in Inuit communities in the Northwest Territories.
Clearly, "overpopulation" is not an issue in North America, nor is it in South
or Central America. Rather, it is a method for reducing specific portions of the
population who would organize against their oppression and who have no place
in the schemes of capital. In other words, "It is more effective to kill guerrillas
in the womb".

Of all the South American countries that underwent massive industrializa-
tion after World War 2, Brazil is probably the most well known. Following a
1964 coup backed by the US, IMF and multinationals, foreign investment rose
steadily. Between 1964-71, over $4 billion had been pumped into Brazil through
the World Bank, AID, IDB, and others. 49

Between 1900-57, the Indigenous population of Brazil had declined from
over 1 million to less than 200, 000, 50 through the rubber boom, ranching, and
mining industries. Following the 1964 coup and the rise in foreign investment,
the penetration of the Amazon region in particular was increased. As these in-
dustries invaded even more Indian lands, a renewed campaign of extermination
accompanied them. Indians were hunted down by death squads, their commu-
nities bombed and massacred, and disease epidemics purposely spread through
injections and infected blankets. In the 1960s alone,

"Of the 19,000 Monducurus believed to have existed in the 30s, only
1200 were left. The strength of the Guaranis had been reduced from

45 Ibid, Pg . 19.
46 Ibid, pg. 41.

47 "Growing Fight Against Sterilization of Native Women", Akwesasne Notes, Vol. 11 No.
1, Winter 1979, pg. 29.
48 Ibid, pg. 29.

49 Supysaua: A Documentary Report on the Conditions of Indian Peoples in Brazil, Indigena
Inc. and American Friends of Brazil, Nov. 1974, pg. 48.
50 Ibid, pg. 6.

34

5,000 to 300. There were 400 Carajas left out of 4,000. Of the
Cintas Largas, who had been attacked from the air and driven into
the mountains, possibly 500 had survived out of 10,000. . . Some like
the Tapaiunas — in this case from a gift of sugar laced with arsenic
— had disappeared altogether". 51

All these atrocities were part of a "pacification" campaign aimed at elimi-
nating the Indians, who here too were seen as obstacles to "development". The
government agencies responsible for "Indian affairs" were some of the worst
agents in this campaign, so much so that the poorly-named Indian Protection
Service had to be disbanded and replaced by the National Indian Foundation
(FUNAI). Not surprisingly, the only real changes were in the names. By 1970,
plans for building an extensive road system for all the industries that had re-
cently invaded the Amazon were announced. The following year, the president
of FUNAI signed a decree which read "Assistance to the Indian will be as
complete as possible, but cannot obstruct national development nor block the
various axes of penetration into the Amazon region". 52 The Trans-Amazonic
road system resulted in the forced relocation of some 25 Indian nations and
thousands of deaths. The struggle against the roads continues today.

Brazil is only one example; similar developments resulted in other South
American countries.

Seemingly in contrast to these extermination campaigns, Canada appeared
to be moving towards a much more "liberal" epoch; why, Natives had even been
given the "right" to vote, the pass laws had been scrapped, and potlatches were
once again permitted! In fact, the Indian Act itself was being viewed by some
as an impediment to the assimilation of Native peoples. The combined effects
of the Indian Act, the residential schools, etc. had so debilitated Native peoples
that they were almost no longer needed; once powerful cultural bases, such as the
potlatch, were reduced to near spectacles for the enjoyment of Euro-Canadians
similar to rodeo shows. By 1969, the government went so far as to articulate
its goals in the aptly-named "White Paper"; the intent was to end the special
legal and constitutional status of Natives, and to deny the relevancy of treaty
rights. Ostensibly a policy to "help" the Indian, the paper even suggested a
total revision of the Indian Act and a gradual phasing out of the Department
of Indian Affairs over a five year period. In the denial of treaty rights and land
claims, the paper stated,

"These aboriginal claims to land are so general and undefined that
it is not realistic to think of them as specific claims capable of rem-
edy except through a policy and program that will end injustice to
Indians as members of the Canadian community". 53

During the same period, Canada was moving towards increased resource ex-
traction. This had begun in the 1950s especially in the mining of uranium for
nuclear energy and as export for the US nuclear energy and weapons industry.
Uranium mining was centred primarily in Saskatchewan and in the US south-
west. As well, there was increased oil and gas exploration in the North and

51 Norman Lewis, "Genocide", Supysaua, op. cit., pg. 9.

52 "The Politics of Genocide Against the Indians of Brazil", Supysaua, op. cit., pg. 35.
53 Government of Canada, statement of the Government of Canada on Indian Policy, 1969,
pg. 11.

35

the development of hydro-electric projects. What better way to push through
these dangerous and damaging projects than by accelerating the government's
long-term assimilation policy and denying Native land title? Clearly, extermi-
nation campaigns in Brazil and assimilation policies in Canada are two sides
of the same coin: destroying Native nations and opening up the lands to fur-
ther exploration. What these governments didn't count on was the continued
resistance of Native peoples.

The People Aim for Freedom

Along with an explosion of international struggles in the 1960s, including na-
tional liberation movements in Afrika, Asia, and in the Americas, there was an
upsurge in Native people's resistance. This upsurge found its background in
the continued struggles of Native peoples and the development of the struggle
against continued resource extraction throughout the Americas.

In South and Central America Native resistance grew alongside the stu-
dent, worker, women's and guerrilla movements, which were comprised largely
of Mestizos in the urban centres.

In Ecuador, the Shuar nation had formed a federation based on regional
associations of Shuar communities in 1964, and was influential in the develop-
ment of other Indigenous organizations; it would also be the focus of government
repression as in 1969 when its main offices were burnt down and its leaders at-
tacked and imprisoned. In 1971, the Indigenous Regional Council of Cauca
(CMC) was formed in Colombia by 2,000 Indians from 10 communities. CMC
quickly initiated a campaign for recuperating stolen reserve lands. In Bolivia,
two Aymaran organizations were formed: the Mink'a and the Movimiento Tupac
Katari. National and international conferences were held in various countries,
and by 1974 a conference in Paraguay drew delegates from every country in
South and Central America from a large number of Indian nations.

A primary focus of these Indigenous movements was recuperating stolen
lands, and widespread occupations, protests, and road blockades were organized.
In Chile, Mapuches began "fence-running" — moving fences which separated
reserve lands from farm lands and extending the reserve territory. In Mexico,
Indigenous peasants carried out large-scale occupations: by 1975 there were 76
occupations in Sinaloa alone, and some 25,000 acres of land occupied in Sinaloa
and Sonora. By December of 1976, tens of thousands occupied land in Sonora,
Sinaloa, Durango, and Coahuila. 54 Of course, these and many other occupations
and protests did not occur without severe repression. Assassinations, massacres,
destruction of communities, and scorched earth policies were directed against
the Indigenous movements.

Similarly, the reclaiming of traditional Indian lands was also a primary focus
of struggle in North America. One of the first of these occupations in this period
was the seizing of the Seaway International Bridge in Ontario by Mohawks, in
December 1968. The action was to protest the Canadian state's decision to levy
customs duties on goods carried across the international border by Mohawks,
despite a treaty which stipulated this right and the fact that the border area was
on Mohawk land. The occupation ended when RCMP and Ontario Provincial

54 Jane Adams, "Mexico — The Struggle for the Land", Indigena, Vol. 3 No. 1, Summer
1977, pg. 28, 30.

36

Police stormed the bridge and arrested 48 Mohawks. However, the struggle
of the Mohawks was was to precipitate occupations which were to follow as a
"Red Nationalism/Red Power" movement swept across both Canada and the
US, alongside Black, Chicano, and Puerto Rican liberation movements.

In 1968, the American Indian Movement (AIM) was formed in Minncapolis-
St. Paul. At first an organization modelled after Euro- American Left groups
and inspired in part by the Civil Rights struggles of the 1950s and 60s, as
well as the Black Panthers, AIM organized against police violence, racism, and
poverty. Initially urban-based and predominantly centred in the Dakotas and
Nebraska, AIM quickly spread to a widespread movement represented in both
urban ghettos and rural reserve areas.

Although AIM members would be involved in many of the struggles that
would develop — partly because AIM was an international movement and not
regional — AIM itself was only one part of the "Red Nationalist" movement.
In 1968, the National Alliance for Red Power had formed on the West Coast,
and the following year Indians occupied Alcatraz Island in San Francisco har-
bour, claiming they had "discovered" it; the occupation would last 19 months
and would become known as the first major event in the struggle for "Red
Power". Another aspect of this period was the continuing local and regional
daily struggles, independent though not totally unrelated from the emerging
Native liberation movement, in communities fighting theft of land, poverty, pol-
lution, etc. In 1970, for example, 200 Metis and Indians occupied the Alberta
New Start Centre at Lac La Biche, protesting against the federal government's
cancellation of the program.

That same year, AIM participated in the occupation of Plymouth Rock
and the Mayflower ship replica on "Thanksgiving Day", as well as organizing
protests and actions against the BIA [Bureau of Indian Affairs — SISIS ed.].
In South Dakota, a protest at the Custer Courthouse was attacked by police,
leading to a riot in which the court and several buildings were burned down.
In 1972, AIM organized the "Trail of Broken Treaties Caravan", and prepared
a 20 point position paper concerning the general conditions of Native peoples
in the US. The Trail ended in Washington, DC, where demonstrators occupied
and destroyed the offices of the BIA.

The following year, traditionalists in the Pine Ridge reservation in South
Dakota requested AIM support after a campaign of terror led by Tribal President
Dick Wilson and BIA thugs. On February 27, a caravan of people went to
Wounded Knee for a council — the site of the 1890 massacre. The area was
almost immediately surrounded by police, and a one day meeting turned into
a 71 day armed occupation in which 300 people resisted a large military and
paramilitary force consisting of FBI agents, BIA police, local and state police,
and military personnel. Two Natives were shot dead, two wounded, and one
Federal Agent wounded. Three weeks into the liberation of Wounded Knee, the
Independent Oglala Nation was established.

"The Independent Oglala Nation was more than just a brave gesture
by a band of besieged Indians. It represented the gravest threat in
more than a century to the plans of the US government to subdue
the Native people of the US and to deprive them of their lands for
the exploitation and profit of white interests". 55

55 "On the Road to Wounded Knee", Indian Nation, Vol. 3, No. 1, April 1976, pg. 15.

37

As supplied dwindled and the military prepared for a final assault, the de-
fenders decided to withdraw. On May 7, about half the people filtered through
the enemy lines, and the following day about 150 who remained laid down their
arms. In the period following, the FBI, BIA, and Wilson's regime conducted a
campaign of terror; by 1976 as many as 250 people in and around Pine Ridge
were dead, including 50 members of AIM. Shootings, firebombings, assaults,
and assassinations were carried out by Wilson's goons and in conjunction with
the FBI's Counter-intelligence Program (COINTELPRO). On June 26, 1975,
an FBI raid on an AIM encampment resulted in a fire-fight in which two FBI
agents and an Oglala, Joseph Stuntz, were shot dead. Although Stuntz' death
was never investigated, nor were the many other killings of Oglala traditionalists
and AIM members during this period, the FBI launched a campaign to imprison
AIM members for the two dead agents. Eventually Leonard Peltier would be
convicted of the killings in a trial that showed nothing more than that the FBI
had fabricated evidence and testimony.

In the same year as the liberation of Wounded Knee, AIM was also es-
tablished in Canada following the Cache Creek highway blockade in BC. The
blockade was against poor housing conditions on a nearby Native reserve. In
November of that year, the Indian Affairs office in Kcnora, Ontario was occu-
pied for one day by Ojibways. The following year, members of the Ojibway
Warrior's Society and AIM initiated an armed occupation of Anicinabe Park,
near Kenora, from July 22 to August 8. Two months earlier, Mohawks from
Akwesasne and Kahnawake had occupied Moss Lake in upper state New York,
reclaiming and renaming the area Ganicnkeh Land of the Flint, the tradi-
tional name for the Kanicnkchake, People of the Flint. After a shooting incident
between White vigilantes and Mohawks, police insisted on entering Ganicnkeh
to investigate but were refused entry. As the threat of a police raid increased,
Natives, including some veterans from Wounded Knee, rushed to Ganicnkeh.
Bunkers were built and defensive lines established. In the end, police withdrew
(in 1977, the Mohawks agreed to leave Moss Lake in exchange for land in Clinton
County, which is closer to Kahnawake and Akwesasne).

On September 14, 1974, the "Native People's Caravan" left Vancouver, initi-
ated by Natives who had participated in the Anicinabe Park occupation. Similar
to the Trail of Broken Treaties, the Caravan demanded recognition and respect
for treaty and aboriginal rights, settlement of Native land claims, an end to
the Indian Act, and an investigation of the DIA by Natives aimed at dissolving
it. By September 30th, the Caravan had brought around 800-900 Natives to
Parliament Hill in Ottawa. Instead of a meeting with parliament, the protest
faced riot police and barricades. As police attacked the demonstration, clashes
broke out, leaving dozens of Natives and nine police injured.

In 1976, the "Trail of Self-Determination" left the west coast of the US as
one of many anti-Bicentennial protests organized by Native peoples. Its purpose
was to get the government's answer to the points raised by the 1972 caravan.
As in that protest, government officials refused to meet with the people and 47
demonstrators were arrested at the BIA offices in Washington, DC.

It was also during this period that Native peoples began organizing around
international bodies. In the US, members of AIM and numerous traditional
leaders and elders formed the International Indian Treaty Conference, in 1974.

"The thrust of the Treaty Conference is for recognition of treaties

38

by the US as a means of restoring sovereign relations between the
native nations and that country. Then, there will be moves to control
exploitation, return control of native lands to. . . the native nation,
and a return of forms of government appropriate to each nation". 56

The IITC was the first Indian organization to apply for and receive UN
Non-Governmental status. Delegates from the IITC, CMC, and other South
and Central American Indigenous organizations formed the basis for developing
legalistic frameworks based on international laws aimed at restoring sovereign
nation status for First Nations. Conferences such as the 1977 UN-sponsored
NGO meeting on "problems of Western Hemisphere Indigenous Peoples" or the
Fourth International Russell Tribunal in 1980 were organized to examine and
document the continuation of gcnocidal practises, and to develop policies con-
cerning these issues/ The end result of these conferences appears to be a forum
for documenting genocide, and, at best, exerting some level of international
pressure on particular countries. As AIM member Russell Means has stated, "It
appears useless to appeal to the US or its legal system to restore its honor by
honoring its treaties". 57 In light of the recent UN role in the US-led Gulf War,
and its recent repeal of the condemnation of Zionism as racism, the UN itself
seems useless.

The Struggle for Land

As previously discussed, the world economic system underwent profound changes
following and as a result of the Second World War. In the post- War economic
boom, plans for new energy policies began to be formulated in the US and
Canada. As already noted, one aspect of these plans was based on uranium
mining and its application in nuclear energy and weapons systems. As well,
plans for diverting water and/or hydro-electric power from Canada to the US
were also formulated in 1964 through the North American Water and Power
Alliance (NAWAPA). Following the 1973 "Oil Crisis", plans for developing "in-
ternal" energy sources were intensified. In the US, this energy policy was dubbed
"Project Independence".

"It seems clear that the US government has anticipated that Amer-
ican natives — like those of other colonized areas of the world who
have tried to resist the theft of their natural resources — might put
up a fight. . . [T]his seems the most logical conclusion to draw from
Senate Bill 826, an expansion of the Federal Energy Act of 1974
into a US centred 'comprehensive energy policy'. Section 616 of this
Bill proposes that the Energy Administrator 'is authorized to pro-
vide for participation of military personnel in the performance of his
functions' and that armed forces personnel so assigned will be, in
effect, an independent 'energy-army', under the direct control of the
Department of Energy". 58

56 "North American Sovereign Nations", Akwesasne Notes, Vol. 8 No. 4, pg. 16.
57 Akwesasne Notes, Vol. 8 No. 6.

58 Paula Giese, "The Last Indian War: For Energy", Report on the Third International
Indian Treaty Conference, June 15-19 1977.

39

As well, in 1971 a group of electrical power generation companies and gov-
ernment resources bureaucrats issued the North Central Power Study, "which
proposed the development of coal strip mining in Montana, Wyoming, and the
Dakotas. . . ". 59

In Canada, these plans can be seen in the hydro-electric projects built in
Manitoba and in James Bay, northern Quebec. There was also the penetra-
tion of the Canadian north with oil and gas exploration, the Mackenzie Valley
pipeline, uranium mining in Saskatchewan, etc. In the US, the new energy
policies precipitated various attacks on Native nations.

In 1974, Public Law 93-531 was passed authorizing the partition of joint
Hopi and Navajo lands in northern Arizona and the forced relocation of some
13,000 people. The purpose of the relocation was ostensibly to resolve a false
"Hopi-Navajo land dispute". In fact, there is some 19 billion tons of coal in
this land. Another example is that of Wounded Knee. During World War 2,
a north-western portion of the Pine Ridge reservation was "borrowed" by the
federal government for use as an aerial gunnery range. It was to be returned
when the war ended.

"Well, the war ended in 1945 and along about 1970, some of the tra-
ditional people one the reserve started asking 'Where is our land? We
want it back'. What had happened was that a certain agency. . . NASA,
had circled a satellite and that satellite was circled in co-operation
with. . . the National Uranium Research and Evaluations Institute. . . What
they discovered was that there was a particularly rich uranium de-
posit within. . . the gunnery range". 60

Dick Wilson was put in place as Tribal Council President, financed, supplied
and backed by the government, with the purpose of having him sign over the
gunnery range lands to the US government. On June 26, 1975, Dick Wilson
signed this 10 per cent of the Pine Ridge reserve land to the federal government;
the same day that the FBI raided the AIM encampment.

"In a period barely exceeding 200 years, the 100% of the territory
which was in Indigenous hands in 1600, was reduced to 10% and
over the next 100 years to 3%. We retain nominal rights to about
3% of our original territory within the USA today. Native peoples
were consigned to what was thought to be the most useless possible
land. . . Ironically, from the perspective of the Predator, this turned
out to be the land which contained about 2/3 of what the US consid-
ers to be its domestic uranium reserve. Perhaps 25% of the readily
accessible low-sulphur coal. Perhaps 1/5 of the oil and natural gas.
Virtually all of the copper and bauxite. . . There is gold. There are
renewable resources and water rights in the arid west". 61

Similar comparisons can be found in Canada and the countries of South
and Central America. With massive changes in industrialization and in energy
demands, along with new technologies in locating and extracting resources, the

59 Ibid.

60 Ward Churchill, "Leonard Peltier, Political Prisoner: A Case History of the Land Rip-
Offs", Red Road, No. 2, June 1991, pg. 6.
61 Ibid, pg. 6.

40

colonization process has, since the Second World War, entered a new phase.
Along with these flashpoints arising from the "Last Indian War: For Energy",
there is the daily demands of capital in other industries such as forestry, fishing,
rubber, agriculture, ranching, etc. and in land for military weapons testing,
training, etc.

Taking these developments since World War 2, and the colonization process
prior t this, an understanding of the history of Indigenous resistance becomes
clearer. Most importantly, however, is understanding that this resistance con-
tinues today.

In Total Resistance

"Now that war is being forced upon us, we will turn our hearts and
minds to war and it too we will wage with all our might. . . Our Spirits
are strong. We are together at last with ourselves and the world of
our ancestors; we are proud before our children and our generations
unborn. . . We are free. No yoke of white government oppression can
contain us. We are free"

- Mohawk Nation Office, August 27, 1990.

In March 1990, the Mohawks of Kanesatake occupied the Pines — traditional
lands which also contain the peoples cemetery and a lacrosse field — against the
Municipality of Oka's plans to expand an adjacent golf course over the Pines.
The golf course expansion was part of Oka's plans to expand a lucrative tourist
industry. On July 11, over 100 members of the Quebec Provincial Police (SQ)
attacked the barricades, opening fire on mostly women and children and firing
tear-gas and concussion grenades. Members of the Kahnawake Warrior's Soci-
ety and warriors from Kanesatake returned fire. In the exchange of fire, one SQ
officer was killed. Following the fire-fight in the Pines and the retreat of the
police, Warriors from Kahnawake seized the Mercier Bridge — a major com-
muter bridge into Montreal — to deter a second SQ attack. More barricades
were erected on roads and highways around both Kanesatake and Kahnawake by
hundreds of Mohawk women and men — setting into motion one of the longest
armed stand-offs in North America in recent history. The stand-off, which saw
hundreds of police and over 4,000 troops from the Canadian Armed Forces de-
ployed, initiated widespread solidarity from Native peoples across Canada; road
and railway blockades were erected, Indian Affairs offices occupied, demonstra-
tions held, and sabotage carried out against railway bridges and electrical power
lines. The vulnerability of such infrastructure was well know, and in fact this
possibility of an escalation of Native resistance was a main part of why there
was no massacre carried out against the Natives and supporters who held out
in the Treatment Centre. On September 26, the last remaining defenders made
the collective decision to disengage — not surrender — and began to move out
of the area. They were, in theory, walking home, refusing to surrender for they
had committed no "crimes" in defending sovereign Mohawk land. Needless to
say, the colonialist occupation forces disagreed and captured the defenders, sub-
jecting some of the Warriors to torture including beatings and mock executions.

At the same time, members of the Peigan Lonefighter's Society had diverted
the sacred Oldman River away from a dam system in Alberta and confronted

41

the RCMP. Milton Born With A Tooth would subsequently be arrested for firing
two warning shots into the air. He has since been sentenced to 18 months.

As well, the Lil'wat nation in BC erected road blockades on their traditional
land in an assertion of their sovereignty as well as part of the solidarity campaign
with the Mohawks. Four months later the RCMP would raid the blockade and
arrest some 50 Lil'wat and supporters, on November 6. On November 24, a
logging operation on Lubicon Cree land in northern Alberta was attacked and
some $20,000 damage inflicted on vehicles and equipment. Thirteen Lubicon
Cree including Chief Bernard Ominayak were subsequently charged with the
action but have yet to be put on trial; a trial they have refused to recognize as
having any jurisdiction on Lubicon Cree land.

During the same period, Indigenous peoples in South America were carrying
forward their struggles.

In Bolivia in October , 1990, some 800 Indians from the Amazon region
Moxcnos, Yuracares, Chimanes and Guaranies — walked 330 miles from the
northern city of Trinidad to La Paz in a month-long "March for Land and Dig-
nity". When the march reached the mountain pass that separates the highlands
from the Amazon plains, thousands of Aymaras, Quechuas and Urus from across
the Bolivian highlands were there to greet them. Like their sisters and brothers
in North America, this march was against logging operations as well as cattle
ranching on Indian land.

In Ecuador, from June 4th to 8th, 1990, a widespread Indigenous upris-
ing paralyzed the country. Nearly all major roads and highways were blocked,
demonstrations and festivals of up to 50,000 spread throughout the country,
despite massive police and military repression. Demonstrations were attacked,
protesters beaten, tear-gassed and shot. Through the coordination of CONAIE
(Confederacion de Nacionalidades del Ecuador) — a national Indian organiza-
tion formed in 1986 — a 16 point "Mandate for the Defense, Life, and Rights
of the Indigenous Nationalities" was released. The demands included control
of Indian lands, constitutional and tax reforms, and the dissolution of various
government-controlled pseudo-Indian organizations. The government agreed to
negotiations on the demands; the uprising had restricted food supplies to the
urban areas, disrupted water and electricity supply, closed down schools, and
occupied oil wells, airports, and radio stations. The Indigenous uprising had
effectively shut down the country.

In the 500 years since the Genocide first landed in the Caribbean, it's clear
that the colonization process continues; the killings, thefts, and destruction of
natural life continues. The original conquistadors have been replaced by mil-
itary forces and death squads in the South, and by military and police forces
in the North. European disease epidemics continue, now joined by deadly pes-
ticides and industrial pollutants. Slavery is gone, so we are told, but in any
case Indigenous peoples, Blacks, and poor Mestizos fill the prisons in dispropor-
tionate numbers. And some things haven't really changed at all: the original
peoples still exist in conditions of poverty, suicides, and the despair of alco-
holism conditions introduced 500 years ago. But something else has also
remained: the spirit of resistance and the struggle against the colonizers. The
resistance against this genocide has been continuous and shows that the people
have neither been defeated nor conquered.

In this way, the Campaign for 500 Years of Indigenous Resistance in 1992
forms an important point in this history: "In our continent, history can be

42

divided into 3 phases; before the arrival of the invaders; these five hundred years;
and that period, beginning today, which we must define and build" (Campaign
500 Years of Resistance and Popular Resistance) .

In the Spirit of Crazy Horse,
In the Spirit of Tupac Katari,
In Total Resistance.

43

Sources for the population of Indigenous peoples prior to 1492 include:

• Henry F. Dobyns, Native American Historical Demography: A Critical
Bibliography, University of Indiana Press 1976; "Estimating Aboriginal
Population: An Appraisal of Techniques with a New Hemispheric Esti-
mate", Current Anthropology, no. 7, 1966.

• Pierre Chanu, Conquete et Exploitation de Nouveaux Mondes (XVIe Steele),
Paris 1969 (estimates population at 80-100 million).

• William R. Jacobs, "The Tip of an Iceberg; Revisionism", in William and
Mary Quarterly, No. 31, 1974 (estimates population at 50-100 million).

• Woodrow Wilson Borah, "America as Model: The Demographic Impact of
European Expansion Upon the Non-European World", in Adas y Memo-
rias XXXV Congreso Internacional de Americanistas, Mexico 1962 (esti-
mates population at 100 million). Source: Roxanne Dunbar Ortiz, Indians
of the Americas.

44

The Anarchist Library

October 17, 2009

Anti-Copyright .
http:/ /thcanarchistlibrary.org
Author: Anonymous
Title: 500 Years of Indigenous Resistance
Publication date: 1992

Retrieved on May 8, 2009 from http://anti-politics.net/distro/text/500years.html
Reprinted from Oh-Toh-Kin, Vol. 1 No. 1, Winter/ Spring 1992. This article is intended as a
basic history of the colonization of the Americas since 1492, and the Indigenous resistance to
this colonization continuing into 1992. The author admits to not having a full understanding
of the traditions of his own people, the Kwakiutl (Kwakwaka'wakw); as such the article lacks
an analysis based in an authentic Indigenous philosophy and is instead more of a historical

chronology.